To: UCT 
From: Paul A. Farrell, Chair.

At the special meeting on May 16, held to discuss recommendation
for the capital plan in the technology area, a subcommittee consisting
of Raymond Craig, Alan Evans, Paul Farrell, John Kerstetter, Terry Kuhn 
and Bruce Petryshak was setup to draft a memo outlining the recommendations
of UCT. The memo produced by this subcommittee is appended. 
Please let me know by Thursday if you have any comments or suggestions.
I should mention that the substantative recommendation of this memo
has already been conveyed to the Executive Officers by Lowell Croskey
and has been mentioned in the President's report to the University 
Community on Resource Management and Administrative Support dated 
May 30, 1997.

Paul A. Farrell
--------------- Memo drafted by Committee ------------------
To: Lowell Croskey
From: University Council on Technology
Subject: UCT Motion on Capital Needs Related to Technology
CC: President Cartwright, Provost Henry, Vice President Rhimes, Director
Latimer

The University Council on Technology (UCT) recommends as follows:

That the University should engage in further infrastructure investment
in the networking initiative by completing intrabuilding wiring in all
eligible buildings and by installing network hubs and procuring network
interface cards (NICs) for workstations to ensure full connectivity 
from all laboratories, classrooms and faculty and staff offices to the
campus backbone and the Internet. 

In order to capitalize on this infrastructure investment by delivering 
the benefits of a technology enabled learning environment to the majority
of students, it is crucial to provide suitable facilities to enable the 
delivery of quality computer and network based classroom instruction.
Students entering Kent from a high school background with substantial
access to computers will have high expectations in the areas of integration
of and access to computers in their instructional programs at the university.
To enable such integration, there is a need to create Master Classrooms
and Computer Classrooms as outlined in the Academic Computing Study 
(ACS). The 1994 ACS study recommended that 10% of all classrooms be
converted to Master Classrooms by 1999 and 5% of all classrooms be
converted to Computer Classrooms. We note that these recommendations were
made before the explosive growth in popularity of computer and network
based information access occasioned by the development of the World Wide
Web (WWW). As well as the creation of Master Classrooms there is a need
to improve additional classrooms, by the installation of window shielding
and dimmable lights and possibly by rewiring, to permit the use
of portable AV equipment such as computer projection equipment. 

In addition, provision should be made for upgrading of the 
physical facilities in existing special purpose laboratories and 
recognition should be given to the probable growth in requirements 
for such laboratories as specialized computing is integrated into the 
learning experience.

To ensure the effective utilization of these enhanced resources, it is
necessary for colleges and departments to coordinate the acquisition of
movable equipment with such renovations/reconstruction, and to investigate
the extent to which collaborative arrangements between departments would
better meet departmental needs in a cost effective manner. 

Recently the UCT was asked to solicit suggestions for possible capital 
projects to aid technology advancement on campus. A primary purpose
of this solicitation was to gauge the needs and possible diversity of 
such projects. A document with those proposals gathered by UCT over a 
10 day period was distributed to UCT by Dewitt Latimer. It should be 
stressed that this was not a comprehensive process to ascertain needs 
campus-wide but should rather be viewed as a sample of the perceived needs. 
It should also be emphasized that the needs deemed most pressing differ 
from department to department and are often closely related to the 
structure of the physical plant as well as to the nature of the 
curriculum in each department.

We hope these considered observations are useful as priorities are set for
technology integration into our instructional programs.