IT governance roundup

Strategic Information Technology Committee (SITC)

August 21, 2018 • Agenda

• Chief Information Officer Steve Hess introduced SITC’s new chair, Dr. Cynthia Furse, professor of electrical and computer engineering, and Associate Vice President for Research. Hess also welcomed new committee members Rebwar Baesmat, IT director in the College of Nursing; Eric Eide, research assistant professor in the School of Computing; and Howard Weeks, Interim Chief Medical Information Officer.
• CIO Hess gave an update on a subcommittee, approved by SITC in May 2018, which is charged with studying customer/constituent relationship management (CRM) use at the university. A university-wide survey to collect a more complete inventory on CRM instances on campus is in the works.
• Rachael Sheedy, associate director for Product Management and Student Systems for University Support Services, gave an update on upgrading to PeopleSoft Campus Solutions 9.2, which gets the university on Oracle’s most current platform. The upgrade is in the testing phase and on track for release in early October. One of the key advantages of the new version, Sheedy said, is the integration of newer “Fluid” pages and applications, promising more intuitive user navigation and a mobile-responsive interface. Deputy CIO Ken Pink praised the efforts of Andrea Roner, associate registrar of Student Systems and Technology, in helping USS retire about 70 percent of modifications made to the enrollment engine, dating back to 1997.
• Deputy CIO Pink updated the committee on University Support Services’ progress towards retiring extraneous custom applications across campus. Pink noted that an inordinate amount of time and financial resources are invested in developing and maintaining customizations within PeopleSoft. 
• Deputy CIO Pink gave an update on an enterprise software policy, approved for development by SITC in May 2018. The policy centers around reducing duplicate applications which do not leverage existing app functionality, lowering integration and maintenance costs, and providing a Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) template to better guide the enterprise software approval process prior to buying, leasing, or building. Pink presented a new draft of the policy, which incorporated feedback from committee members, and explained that the next step will be to present the policy to the Institutional Policy Committee (IPC) for review. The committee agreed to seek further governance approval of the policy after it’s reviewed by the IPC, with the stipulation that a marketing campaign be developed.
• CIO Hess facilitated a discussion on U Health Sciences’ custom-built financial and research managerial accounting system, and how it fits into the developing enterprise software process. Developing the portal was requested by nine U Health Science departments that saw a need for a better financial accounting and financial management tool. After a lengthy discussion, cognizant IT staff from campus and hospital agreed to meet to further discuss requirements.
• Chief Information Security Officer Randy Arvay gave a brief update on a vendor-caused incident on August 20, 2018 that temporarily degraded Duo 2FA authentication service at the university. Arvay also discussed a recent legislative security audit and an upcoming Board of Regents policy change regarding data and device encryption. Arvay then updated the committee on a data security breach in April 2018 at the Moran Eye Center and subsequent investigation by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Office for Civil Rights (OCR). Finally, Dustin Udy, data security analyst, discussed his experience on the Utah System of Higher Education (USHE) informationsecurity team, which conducts physical security evaluations and penetration testing on computer systems at USHEinstitutions. Udy is seeking volunteer departments to take part in a similar review at the U, using Center for Internet Security (CIS) controls, pen testing, and issuance of recommendations to improve security posture.
• The next SITC meeting will be held on Tuesday, September 18, 2018 from 1:00 p.m. to 2:45 p.m. in the Winder Boardroom, Park Building.

Architecture and New Technology Committee (ANTC)

• There were no ANTC meetings in July. The next ANTC meeting will be held on Monday, August 27, 2018 from 10:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m. in the Dumke Conference Room, Eccles Broadcast Center.

Teaching and Learning Portfolio (TLP)

• The Portfolio did not meet in July. The next TLP meeting will be held on Wednesday, September 26, 2018 from 2:00 p.m. to 3:30 p.m. in MLIB 5201, Marriott Library.

Enterprise Web Advisory Council (EWAC)

• There were no EWAC meetings in July or August. The next EWAC meeting will be held on Thursday, September 13, 2018 from 11:00 a.m. to noon in the Dumke Conference Room, Eccles Broadcast Center.

 

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