Technology Enhancing Tradition: The Architecture of Information Technology for Higher Education Ed 8

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Technology Enhancing Tradition The Architecture
of Information Technology for Higher
EducationEd 860 Technology in Higher
EducationNovember 23, 1999
José-Marie GriffithsUniversity Chief Information
OfficerThe University of Michigan
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SAME SLIDE STILL UP
Technology Enhancing Tradition The Architecture
of Information Technology for Higher
EducationFaculty Workshop on Educational
TechnologyHoward UniversityApril 3, 1999
José-Marie GriffithsUniversity Chief Information
OfficerThe University of Michigan
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Planning for Info tech the CIO as Architect for
Change
Imagination is the pontoon bridge making way for
the timid feet of reason.
unknown

• Architecture is art and science freed by
  imagination
• Architects work is based on parameters
• environmental
• social
• cultural

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The IT ArchitectEnvironmental Parameters
When you travel, remember that a foreign
country is not designed to make you
comfortable. It is designed to make its own
people comfortable. Clifton Fadiman

• Land structure and availability
• Sun exposure
• Wind patterns
• Temperature
• Available materials
• Must fit into your context

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IT-Related Environmental Parameters at U-M
Men are disturbed not by things, but by the view
which they take of them. Epictetus

• Land structure and availability size,
  decentralization
• Sun exposurepublic institution, funding issues
• Wind patternslocated in Michigan
• Temperaturehot! Intensity progress
• Available materialsstrong faculty,
  administration, staff, research emphasis

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IT Architect Cultural/Social Parameters
It is curious to note the old sea-margins of
human thought. Each subsiding century reveals
some new mystery we build where monsters used to
hide themselves. Longfellow

• Values
• Community personality
• Personality the communitydesires to project

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IT-Related Cultural/Social Parameters at U-M
Education, then, beyond all other devices of
human origin, is the great equalizer of the
conditions of men the balance-wheel of the
social machinery. Horace Mann

• Presence
• Culture

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IT-Related Cultural/Social Parameters at U-M
Education, then, beyond all other devices of
human origin, is the great equalizer of the
conditions of men the balance-wheel of the
social machinery. Horace Mann
SAME SLIDE STILL UP
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IT-Related Cultural/Social Parameters at U-M
Educations purpose is to replace an empty
mind with an open one.Malcolm Forbes

• Leadership priorities and style
• Traditions leadership, excellence

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Design Response of the Architect Guiding
Principles
Things which matter most must never be at the
mercy of things which matter least.
Goethe
Contribution
Community
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Design Response of the Architect Guiding
Principles
The illiterate of the 21st century will not be
those who cannot read and write, but those who
cannot learn, unlearn, and relearn. Alvin
Toffler
Equity
Diversity
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Design Response of the Architect Strategic
Directions Academic Initiatives
For in the end, we will conserve only what we
love. We will love only what we understand. We
will understand only what we are taught.
Baba Dioum

• Develop and implement University-wide IT
  initiatives that support teaching and learning,
  research, and scholarship, and that improve the
  experience and use of IT in support of academic
  excellence.

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Design Response of the ArchitectStrategic
Directions Infrastructure and Core Services
The loftier the building, the deeper the
foundation must be laid. Thomas Kempis

• Provide a robust IT infrastructure, including
  enabling technologies (middleware) and core
  applications, that supports the activities of
  teaching and learning, research, and
  administration, and that allows for product
  evolution and advanced applications.

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Design Response of the ArchitectStrategic
Directions Collaboration
Coming together is a beginning keeping together
is progress working together is success.
Henry Ford

• Build and facilitate a strong spirit of IT
  collaboration within the University and with
  external organizations

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Importance of Involving FacultyFaçade vs.
Function
GARGOYLE, n. A rain-spout projecting from the
eaves of medieval buildings, commonly fashioned
into a grotesque caricature of some personal
enemy of the architect or owner of the building
when a new dean and chapter were installed the
old gargoyles were removed and others substituted
having a closer relation to the private
animosities of the new incumbents.
Ambrose Bierce

• At U-M involve faculty through
• Information Technology Strategic Directions Group
  (Deans)
• Deans Partnership program

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Importance of Involving FacultyFunctional Needs
and Change
If we dont change direction soon, well end
up where were going. Professor Irwin Corey

• Also involve faculty through
• Faculty survey/student surveys
• Media Union new organization
• Exploration of faculty role in using technology
  for teaching/learning

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ArchitectureDifferent Ways to Experience Space
I know the answer! The answer lies within the
heart of all mankind! The answer is twelve? I
think Im in the wrong building. Charles
Schulz

• Physical
• Perceptual
• Behavioral
• Dynamic

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TODAYS INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY A Different
Experience of Computing
Neurotics build castles in the air, psychotics
live in them. My mother cleans them. Rita
Rudner

• Physical
• Perceptual
• Behavioral
• Dynamic

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New Models for Leading IT Internally
It is hard to let old beliefs goLike a man who
has worn eyeglasses so long that he forgets he
has them on, we forget that the world looks to us
the way it does because we have become used to
seeing it that way through a particular set of
lenses. Today, however, we need new lenses. And
we need to throw the old ones away. Kenich
Ohmae

• University of Michigan IT Federation

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New Models for Leading IT Externally
Nothing average ever stood as a monument to
progress. When progress is looking for a partner
it doesnt turn to those who believe they are
only average. It turns instead to those who are
forever searching and striving to become the best
they possibly can A. Lou Vickery

• Strategic Alliance Program

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ArchitectureForces that Challenge Structures
Absence extinguishes small passions and
increases great ones, as the wind blows out a
candle, and blows in a fire. Duc de La
Rochefoucauld

• Gravity
• Environmental forces natural and manmade
  (weather, pollution, etc.)
• Compression/tension

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Forces Challenging Higher Ed People Changes
In a time of drastic change, it is the learners
who inherit the future. The learned usually find
themselves equipped to live in a world that no
longer exists. Eric Hoffer

• Gravity more students
• Environmental forces new student demographics
• Compression/tension new student lifestyles and
  attitudes

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Forces Challenging Higher Ed People Changes
In a time of drastic change, it is the learners
who inherit the future. The learned usually find
themselves equipped to live in a world that no
longer exists. Eric Hoffer

• SAME SLIDE
• STILL UP

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Forces Challenging Higher EdTechnology Changes
Traveling is the ruin of all happiness! Theres
no looking at a building after seeing Italy.
Fanny Burney

• Gravitypersonal availability. Computers as a
  household appliance
• Environmental forcesubiquitous connectivity
  distance learning availability
• Compressioncomputing in preschool

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Role of Higher Education in a Changing Landscape
The art of progress is to preserve order amid
change and to preserve change amid order.
Alfred North Whitehead

• more use of technology at traditional
  universities
• more outreach to communities by traditional
  universities
• redefinition of communities by traditional
  universities

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ArchitectureThe Basics
The physician can bury his mistakes, but the
architect can only advise his client to plant
vines. Frank Lloyd Wright

• Foundation
• Physical properties of building materials
• Scalability

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U-M IT Structure and FuturesThe Wall
Ive finally learned what upward compatible
means. It means we get to keep all our old
mistakes Dennie Van Tassel
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U-M IT Structure and FuturesThe Wall
Ive finally learned what upward compatible
means. It means we get to keep all our old
mistakes Dennie Van Tassel
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Loose bricks and the need for hard hats...
Be aware that a halo has to fall only a few
inches to be a noose. Dan McKinnon

• Y2K
• U-M Campus Computing Sites iMacs with no floppy
  disk drives

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U-M IT Structure and FuturesUniversity-Wide
Academic Initiatives
The hardest thing to learn in life is which
bridge to cross and which to burn. David
Russell

• Build the backbone application
• environment for initiatives such as
• Instructional environment
• Digital library
• Collaboration technologies
• Multimedia development, products and services

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U-M IT Structure and FuturesUniversity-Wide
Academic Initiatives
The hardest thing to learn in life is which
bridge to cross and which to burn. David
Russell

• Create a software testing laboratory
• Initially, to do usability testing for
• M-Pathways student modules

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U-M IT Structure and FuturesInfrastructure and
Core Services
The greater part of all mischief in the world
arises from the fact that men do not sufficiently
understand their own aims. They have undertaken
to build a tower, and spend no more labor on the
foundation than would be necessary to erect a
hut. Johan Wolfgang van Goethe

• Networkingwithin University buildings, backbone,
  and out to the community.
• Reinforce the enabling technology or middleware
  levelidentification, authentication,
  authorization, security and e-commerce.
• Fund the production environment for M-Pathways
  and plan the phase out of legacy production
  systems.

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U-M IT Structure and FuturesCollaboration
We must learn to live together as brothers or
perish together as fools. Martin Luther King,
Jr.

• Incentives for Federation initiatives
• Recruitment and retention of technical staff
• Re-training of legacy systems staff

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U-M IT Structure and Futures Other Key
Initiatives
It shouldnt be too much of a surprise that the
Internet has evolved into a force strong enough
to reflect the greatest hopes and fears of those
who use it. After all, it was designed to
withstand nuclear war, not just the puny huffs
and puffs of politicians and religious
fanatics. Denise Caruso

• Internet2/Abilene
• Ameritech Learning Initiative
• High Performance Computing
• ERIC writing laboratory
• Cross-disciplinary projects

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IT Architects Roles and Responsibilities
Politicians are the same all over. They promise
to build a bridge where there is no river.
James Joyce

• Architects work from their own
• Vision
• Education
• Experience
• Sense of social Responsibility

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IT Architects Roles and Responsibilities
Politicians are the same all over. They promise
to build a bridge where there is no river.
James Joyce

• Must reinforce what you have to work
• withthe natural strengths and
• opportunities of your environment,
• materials, and resources.
• The technology is the least important
• part.

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IT Architects Roles and Responsibilities
Politicians are the same all over. They promise
to build a bridge where there is no river.
James Joyce

• Must reinforce what you have to work
• withthe natural strengths and
• opportunities of your environment,
• materials, and resources.
• The technology is the least important
• part.

SAME SLIDE STILL UP
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IT Architects Roles and Responsibilities
Politicians are the same all over. They promise
to build a bridge where there is no river.
James Joyce

• Must reinforce what you have to work
• withthe natural strengths and
• opportunities of your environment,
• materials, and resources.
• The technology is the least important
• part.

SAME SLIDE STILL UP
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Technology Enhancing TraditionThe Architecture
of Information Technology into the 21st Century
If I see farther than others, it is because I
am standing on the shoulders of giants.Sir
Isaac Newton
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José-marie griffithsUniversity Chief Information
OfficerThe university of michigan5080 Fleming
Administration BuildingAnn Arbor, Michigan
48109-1349Phone [phone]email
jmgriff_at_umich.eduCIO Web Page
http//www.cio.umich.edu