Outsourcing Student Email and Other Collaboration Services

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Outsourcing Student E-mail and Other
Collaboration Services

• John Calkins
• Assistant General Counsel
• Northwestern University Office of General Counsel
  (OGC)
• Wendy Woodward
• Director, Technology Support Services
• Northwestern University Information Technology
  (NUIT)

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Northwestern University

• Carnegie Classification RU/VH (R1)
• Private
• 17,000 students
• 7,000 faculty and staff
• 190,000 alumni
• Evanston and Chicago campuses
• Highly decentralized
• 10 schools
• Professional schools have custom
• student / alumni management programs

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Drivers and the Environment

• Student Government request for Google Apps
• Aging e-mail infrastructure
• Increasing number of e-mail users forward mail
  off campus
• Calendar for faculty and staff only
• Alumni forwarding service is declining
• Official University e-mail sent to University
  provided account
• Multiple domains

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Investigation Process

• Examine Services
• Free services offered to the education community
• Basic offerings include large e-mail accounts,
  calendaring, IM, and more
• Understand Benefits to Providers
• Companies want life-long customers
• Advertising revenue
• Determine best fit for Northwestern

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Key Stakeholders

• Board of Trustees
• NUIT
• Office of General Counsel
• Student Affairs
• Office of Development and Alumni Relations
• Student Financial Services
• Office for Research
• School of Law
• The Graduate School

• Enrollment Services
• Provost Office
• Feinberg School of Medicine
• Kellogg School of Management
• University Relations
• School Technology Leaders
• Associated Student Government and other student
  leaders
• Graduate Student Association

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Institutional Conversations

• Individual meetings with key stakeholders to
  gauge institutional level of interest and address
  concerns
• Adjust strategy based on feedback
• Open meeting with all stakeholders to share
  findings and proposed direction
• Plan-development meetings with Alumni Relations
  and Board of Trustees members
• Progress meetings with IT committees
• Open meeting to present deployment strategy

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What We Heard

• Outsourcing these services to Google would
  improve student and alumni services, and be a
  positive thing to do
• IF
• Security, privacy, and policy concerns are
  adequately addressed.

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Timeline
2005
2006
Idea Surfaces Investigation of Available
Services Students Demand Improved
Services Discussions with University
Stakeholders Preferred Vendor Identified Contract
Negotiations
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Timeline

Contract Negotiations Deployment Timeline
Developed Implementation Deployed for Current
Students as Opt-In Service Service as
Default Service for incoming Students Service
as Default Service for incoming Law
students Work to include other Students and
Alumni
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Key Elements of the Service

• The Agreement
• Security and privacy concerns addressed
• Student data will not be shared or used for
  marketing
• Data is protected in a FERPA-appropriate manner
• NU can exit the agreement at any time
• User Interface
• Student services are advertisement-free
• Prominent NU branding (along with Google
  branding) on the service pages

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E-mail Inbox
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Key Elements of the Service

• System Management
• Reliable pathway to Google system engineers for
  problem resolution
• NUIT access to the system to resolve issues
• Opportunity to provide input into product
  development

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_at_u.northwestern.edu Services

• Self-Service Account Activation and Management
• E-mail
• Calendar
• Documents and Spreadsheets
• Chat/Instant Messaging
• Google Talk (Basic VoIP)
• Shared Address Book
• Group Accounts
• Custom Start Page/Web Portal
• Help Center

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Self-Service Account Activation

• Eligible students can self-activate accounts
• Undergraduates
• School of Continuing Studies
• Degree and Certificate students
• Graduate students
• Staff in degree programs
• Northwestern Law
• _at_nlaw.northwestern.edu domain

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Self-Service Account Management

• Manage _at_u.northwestern.edu account while NetID is
  active
• Create and manage up to three nicknames
• Reset password
• Update for formal name change
• Account name cannot be changed
• Graduation/separation options
• Keep account which will display advertisements
• Delete account (20 day window before NetID
  expiration)
• Keep account and manually delete account data
• Post-graduation account management options
• Office of Alumni Relations and Development

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Group Accounts

• Accounts can be activated for groups
• Recognized student groups
• Schools
• Departments
• Submit web form to apply
• http//vovici.com/wsb.dll/s/9260g2b019
• Enables group collaboration
• Calendar management and sharing
• Group communication
• Document sharing and archiving
• Meeting resource management

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Learning from Experience

• Involve the community Many stakeholders!
• Listen, adjust, listen, adjust, listen, adjust...
• Compare against todays reality
• Look at the data
• Talk to the vendors
• Determine if the benefits outweigh the risks
• Pick the best solution for your environment
• Maintain flexibility

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• Questions and Answers
• http//www.it.northwestern.edu/stucollab/index.htm
  l
• john-calkins_at_northwestern.edu
• wwk_at_northwestern.edu

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Account Login Single sign-on
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Account Activation
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Account Activation - Confirmation
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Account Management Add/Remove nicknames
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Online Directory Student and Staff display
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Mail Account Settings Reply to restricted
listservs
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Integrated Chat
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Calendars
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Documents and Spreadsheets Main page
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Law School Start Page
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_at_u.northwestern.edu Support Pages