God can be glorified in every situation...

Hello

Dormnet is Harding's help desk for students. It is staffed by a group of wonderful student workers known as Dormnet Assistants (DNAs)

It is a service provided by Harding’s Student Support & Communication, managed by Lora Fleener that brings the Internet and the campus network directly to a student’s personal computer.

Some facts about Dormnet:
 Location 
Administration Bldg.
Room 205

School Hours 
Monday - Thursday:
11 am - 10 pm
Friday: 11 am - 5 pm

Summer Hours
Monday-Friday
8 am - 12 noon
1 pm - 5 pm
In addition to the help desk operations, the DNAs have been compiling a blog focused on being a source of information for students who are seeking help with using IT in the dorms.

Recently one of the DNAs compiled an entry in the blog that reflected on his three years working in Dormnet. It is a thoughtful reflection. You can read the complete entry by following this link: http://dormnet.blogspot.com/2015/05/looking-back.html

In particular, I was encouraged by the last section of his blog post. Even if you do not have time to read the complete blog entry, I wanted to share with you this section from his post. 

We have some great students at Harding, who are learning so many things that we may not be aware of on a day to day basis. This is a great reminder of this, and also a great encouragement for each of us to do the same.

Sam says:

• God can be glorified in every situation. When I applied for DormNet, I wasn't initially thinking that it would be a great way to serve God. I was just looking for a job, and this one was highly recommended to me by my friends. However, in working here these last three years I have seen that we can be giving glory to God in every situation. Every time students come to us seeking help with their computer issues, we have an opportunity to be servants of Him and show everyone His love. Computers can be frustrating to deal with, but to be able to be friendly and loving in the face of the frustrations they can bring I think can be a great Christian thing to do. We interact with students from all different walks of life, and the way we act and serve gives us an opportunity to reflect Christ in our interactions and give glory to Him. He can use us to improve other students' lives through this service that we have learned how to do. Through this job, I have learned that it really doesn't matter what service or job we're doing, anything and everything we do can be used to glorify Him. I hope that whatever you are doing and wherever you are in life, you can remember this and use your skills for Him.

Print is dead!

This post is from Paula Kirby. Paula directs the E-learning and Multimedia Services department in IS&T

How Popular is the Printed Page in 2015?

In The Reading Brain, in the Digital Age: The Science of Paper versus Screens, Mr. Jabr states that studies find “few signification differences in reading speed and comprehension between paper and screens” (Jabr, 2013) Judging from the numbers of HU's last print report, the printed page is still in demand on Harding's campus.

According to our records, there were 6,561,512 copies made during the 2011/12 school year. At the mid-point of the 2014/15 school year, we have printed 6,012,966 (See Table 1 below). While this number fluctuates, this represents a considerable lower number. And consistently the number at the end of the year is less the double the mid year number. So, we may be heading for a record low year of printing (these numbers come from the Canon printers and Multi Function Devices on campus).

So where do these number come from? Check out the link below to see the copy count from your area:

Mid Year Copy Count by Area

Jabr, F. (2013, April 11). The reading brain in the digital age: The science of paper versus screen. Retrieved from Scientific American: http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/reading-paper-screens/

Table 1.

Business Intelligence...

We are now well and truly in the full swing of a wonderful spring semester here at Harding University. 

There are some exciting things planned for release over the next few months. Most visibly will be our redesigned web site. It is still on schedule for release at the end of March. 

The other project to mention is the business intelligence (BI) system. The vendor chosen to produce our BI was Birst, a cloud based system. 

According to Gartner, Business intelligence (BI) is an umbrella term that includes the applications, infrastructure and tools, and best practices that enable access to and analysis of information to improve and optimize decisions and performance.

(I am sure there are other less flattering descriptions of business intelligence!)

The development team at Harding are on working on our first dashboards - Retention, Graduation Rates and an Enrollment dashboards. They will show trends and provide the ability to drill down at various levels. The information in the dashboards is drawn a data warehouse that holds accurate current and historical data.

BI systems provide great information for planning and decision making. We will be adding more dashboards as the development continues.

The BI system at Harding has been given the name, Tardis. What is Tardis? The Tardis is the time machine that Dr Who uses. It stands for, Time And Relative Dimension In Space! On the outside it is a British Police Box, but inside it is much larger with many rooms and so forth. For those who want to know more (and who doesn't), check this out - The Tardis. 

BI systems are a bit like that as well - simple on the outside, more complex as you get into them. I know - it is a bit 'nerdy' but we needed to call it something.

There are some dashboards below that Google provides for us. These dashboards give us a good idea of how we used some of our Google Apps suite last Fall. As we look at these dashboards over time, it can help us plan for future use, services and capacity.

God  bless you all as we serve Him this semester. 

Who Let the Dogs In?

The Brackett Library brought along some therapy dogs for the first time during finals week this semester. Apart from being very cute and being man's best friend, they proved to be calming for the students who went along to pet and be with the dogs.

What did the students think of this? Here are some of their comments:
"The support dogs in the library were one of my favorite things that Harding has offered. I went before a final and the chihuahua, Tyler, just snuggled up to me, sat there looking at me with his big brown eyes and any anxiety I had just melted away.  So many students were impacted by the power of these animals, one girl said that she wanted to take a dog into her final so she could pet him while taking her test."

"Thanks so much for doing this!!  This was a great idea".

"The best part of finals week--dogs to pet in the library!"

"...I could feel the atmosphere change.  It provided students the chance to step out of their stressful week. People were happier and more relaxed. It's amazing the power that animals have to soothe the soul."

And from a library worker: 
"The dogs provided a wonderful break for students, a moment in their hectic frenzy of final exams to slow down and enjoy something simple and fun.  :)"

Did you miss seeing the dogs on Wednesday? Not to worry they will be back this Friday (December 12) afternoon from 3.00pm to 5.00pm

While a lot of the students will have left the campus by then, those engaged in grading might want a way to relieve some anxiety. So come on over to the library on Friday from 3.00pm - 5.00pm to spend some calming time with a puppy.

Finally I want to share the feedback from the therapy dog handlers. This speaks so much for the great Harding community:

"Jean, just a short follow up on therapy dogs in the library.  I want to extend a heart felt THANK YOU for inviting ABLEPaws to your library.  I hope the event was everything you expected or even more.
My volunteers were so excited to be there and participate.  We honestly have never been thanked by so many different students/staff for coming.  It was wonderful to be a part of and witness.  
Please let me know if in the future we can be of service to your establishment again.  We look forward to serving you again.
Also on behalf of ABLEPaws my volunteers would like to thank you & the library staff for the gifts provided to our volunteers. The gifts were not necessary or required at all.  However, your thoughtfulness has touched our hearts greatly.  Steve, Nancy, Amy, Candee, and I extend a sincere THANK YOU as well as our fur babies!  
Thank you again,
TJ & Bella"

Thanks to Jean Waldrop the other library staff for this initiative. Jean sums it by saying:

"I always get a little anxious trying something new but the smiles on the student's faces and the positive comments I heard made me feel good about the decision to have therapy dogs in the library."

Harding Partners with Ritter Communication

During the week of Thanksgiving, IS&T will be moving our primary Internet connection to Ritter Communications. Ritter is headquartered in Jonesboro, Arkansas.

With its roots in northeast Arkansas, Ritter started as a telephone company providing the first dial tone to many rural communities.  Today Ritter serves 59 communities and more than 45,000 customers in northeast and north central Arkansas and west Tennessee with a full suite of communications services including high speed internet, voice, video, and broadband connectivity.

For the past several months, you may have seen Ritter trucks around Searcy installing fiber optic cable to extend their services into our community.  “We’re very excited to name Searcy among the elite ‘gig cities’ in the nation, and we’re excited to be the internet backbone for Harding University.” said Steve Smith, Vice President of Sales at Ritter.“

Ritter has had great success in offering local businesses in our service areas the kind of advanced broadband services typically found only in large metro areas.” 

Ritter has built their fiber optic network directly into Harding’s Data Center.  This will enable Harding to have a lower cost position, increase their user experience, and take advantage of the broadband connection for future growth applications.

Brackett Library Wants To Serve You

Brackett Library has been busy since the beginning of the semester.  The Library has been open 82 days this semester and has had 123,690 visits to the library, on top of the 66,290 visits to the Library web home page.

Our eight librarians, seven staff members and forty student workers have all taken the time to be prepared and enjoy serving you and our students.  The following is just a small list of ways that we can assist both faculty and students:

• Recommend a Book – This link can be found on the right hand side of the library home page.  If there is an item that you think the library should consider purchasing, just fill out the information for us.

• Research Help – There is a librarian or trained staff (our Information Assistant) available for you 74 hours a week.  (The library is open 84 hours a week so librarians are happy to schedule a time to meet with you if needed).

• Study Space – The library is a place where you can settle in for some study time.  Downstairs provides a space to work in small groups while upstairs is for those who like it a little quieter.

• Suggestion Box – A link can be found down on the right hand corner of the library home page.  Your input matters!

What’s next?  We are already thinking ahead to one of our busiest times – Dead week and Finals Week!  And what are we thinking? Some possibilities are extended hours, late night snacks, and bringing therapy dogs to the library to help relieve a little bit of the stress!  

Necessary Security Updates and Downtime

Hello

A number of security vulnerability warnings have been issued recently. Usually the patches and fixes for these warnings can be implemented without any significant or noticeable downtime. 

However, there are some current security issues that need more immediate attention and will require downtime. The two most significant issues we must deal with are related to a vulnerability to our Oracle databases (POODLE) and security certificates which Google Chrome will flag as insecure starting sometime in November. Some updates will also be performed at the same time.

We will be working on correcting these issues on Saturday, October 25, 2014 from 7.00am to 7.00pm. A number of our services will not be available during this time.

The services that will NOT be available are: 

• The Oracle databases (all of them, including Banner)
• Pipeline
• Banner Forms
• Testing Lab Scheduler
• Argos
• Famis
• Appworx

Services that WILL be available are:

• Internet
• Email (use https://connect.harding.edu, not the Pipeline icon)
• M-drives and other shares
• Echo360
• Canvas (use the direct link - https://harding.instructure.com)

Thank you in anticipation for your understanding as these issues are addressed.

Be sure to thank our Systems and Database Administration team for taking care of this. Who are they? Glad you asked. 

   

Jon WryeLyn BlansettPeter KirbyEric Bond