All attendees joined remotely, via Zoom.

Attendees (10):
Jon Becker, Michael Cabral, Amita Chin, Andrew Ilnicki, Oscar Keyes, Kirk Richardson, Valerie Robnolt (Chair), Debra Shockey, Jim Smither, Shanaka Wijesinghe

Also in attendance (8):
Ex officio members (3): Colleen Bishop, Alex Henson, Elaine Reeder
Scribe (1): Jana Avery
Guests (4): John Bogan, Houston Griffith, Jared Parker, Hannah Steighner

Valerie opened the meeting, welcomed everyone. There were several new members and guests in attendance, so she asked everyone to introduce themselves.

The April 2022 meeting minutes were reviewed and accepted, with no corrections needed.

Should FTAC meet three times each semester? 
Valerie mentioned that the committee always has a lot to cover and we really need to think about meeting more often. She said the committee will meet again on Oct. 3rd since there are many items to follow-up on. There was no discussion or decision at this time about increasing the frequency of the meetings.

Action Item: A discussion is needed to determine if FTAC should meet more often. Valerie said this could be discussed in the spring (2023).

Workgroup to Look at Classroom Technology

Classroom Workgroup Focus and Volunteers
Colleen Bishop explained that a small workgroup will beformed, led by John Bogan, and tasked with the following:

• Look at centrally-supported classrooms and evaluate existing technology (hardware and software) so that FTAC can determine if they meet the needs of the university.
• This small workgroup will present their findings to FTAC in October.

Classroom Surveys
Valerie asked about the end-of-semester classroom surveys that Jared distributes to instructors assigned to teach in centrally supported classrooms. Jared shared information about this and also stated that there are currently 174 centrally supported classrooms, which includes both campuses.

Hybrid Classes and Technology
Valerie stated that the university needs to define hybrid classes, which will help determine what technology is needed for the classrooms. (FTAC submitted this request to Dr. Rao earlier this year.) She also mentioned the Online Strategy Taskforce, which was tasked with defining hybrid classrooms. Jon Becker shared his experience with students who want the hybrid experience and how he brings some technologies (microphones, etc) with him for an interim solution, but said that he shouldn’t have to do this. He stated that the two primary objectives are to (1) determine what technology is needed, and (2) scheduling--how to get the right faculty in the right classrooms for hybrid (or other teaching methods).

Jared Parker said that the MCV campus classrooms are hybrid-ready, but that we need to define what is expected, technology-wise for the classrooms. We need to define what “standard” and “hybrid” classrooms are, so that technology needs can be appropriately assessed. There are a lot of schools that work with users of the classrooms, and then reach out to AT/MSS regarding any issues or needs. Feedback from MCV is still valuable. Houston elaborated on defining these “standard” classroom technologies, and shared a classroom and lab inventory of rooms maintained by facilities management.

Classroom workgroup
John, Jared and Houston elaborated further on the delays with updating the classrooms due to difficulties  obtaining equipment from vendors and scheduling the rooms. MSS will accommodate the classroom workgroup’s schedule, but scheduling the rooms for touring and assessment could be the determining factor for the timeline.  Valerie volunteered to be part of the workgroup, and said that it would be ideal to have someone from the MCV campus participate as well.  Volunteers for the classroom workgroup: Valerie Robnolt and Kirk Richardson.

Michael Cabral suggested the classroom workgroup take a tour of several different classrooms--classrooms that accommodate large and small classes, what needs there are, etc. A diverse classroom tour might lead to having several “standard” classrooms defined, rather than one for all.

HEETF
Regarding hybrid teaching and classroom needs, Shanaka Wijesinghe suggested that multiple departments collaborate to submit one large, campus-wide HEETF request. Alex Henson elaborated on this and current HEETF allocations. Shanaka stated that a massive push is needed to get all the rooms updated, rather than going room-by-room, which would take too long. Alex explained all the requests and how they are prioritized and that we are already pushing for classroom funding as a top priority. John Bogan shared more details about this prioritization and efforts to get the rooms updated. Alex stated that most of the larger classrooms are already hybrid-ready.  A discussion about HEETF continued, and questions were raised about whether anyone from FTAC is on the HEETF committee. Alex is part of the committee, and said there are representatives from both campuses and that the committee is run by William Nelson in the provost’s office.

Valerie asked questions to clarify funding since HEETF is only one of many options. Alex said 4.9 million dollars worth of work requests have come in. The majority of them are earmarked for upgrades; about 1.5 million is allotted to TS; allocation of student tech fees, which has also been used for classroom upgrades. He thinks we have a good amount of funding for this initiative, and if there was more, we would have trouble allocating them all.  

Valerie asked questions to clarify funding since HEETF is only one of many options. Alex said 4.9 million dollars worth of work requests have come in. The majority of them are earmarked for upgrades; about 1.5 million is allotted to TS; allocation of student tech fees, which has also been used for classroom upgrades. He thinks we have a good amount of funding for this initiative, and if there was more, we would have trouble allocating them all.  

Action Item: Anyone interested in participating in the classroom workgroup should contact Valerie or Colleen.

Future of UAAITSC

Who will provide the oversight of large monetary proposals?

Alex explained that IT Governance has defined procurement and approval processes. Plans are underway to simplify the processes and maybe have smaller governance groups.

• An assessment of the threshold for what needs approval and from where, needs to take place.
• Right now the processes are followed for all requests, so maybe a simpler approach would be to separate approval processes by types--academic software, research; and also get feedback from FTAC and other groups.
• Hannah has researched, talked with other universities, etc. and has begun forming a taskforce to lead this effort, share feedback, etc. The taskforce will definitely include faculty representatives. So far Amita Chin and Deverick Strand are confirmed taskforce members.  
• Valerie recommended that Scott Street be included in the taskforce, due to his long history of teaching at VCU.

Action Item: Hannah Steighner will attend the October FTAC meeting with an update on UAAITSC.

Adobe Apps to Support Digital Literacy

New Adobe Licensing
Andrew Ilnicki spoke about the new Adobe Creative Cloud licensing that includes VCU student access, and the benefit to our students. We have Adobe Ambassadors on campus and are setting up Calendly for scheduling consultations during open office hours. Oscar Keyes is also involved in this initiative.

Adobe Workshops and Events
Oscar Keyes shared information about consultations, upcoming training and events. The big event in October is the Adobe Creative Jam, which will include workshops primarily for students, but Oscar is leading three workshops that are aimed at faculty and in partnership with CTLE. Most of the workshop series this year has been focused on Adobe. He is working with specific areas, like University College, to plan workshops for multimodal components; and is partnering with the da Vinci Center to see how he can utilize student workers for consultations and possibly open office hours. 

Faculty Cost and Student Support: Shanaka Wijesinghe pointed out that faculty still have to pay for it (Adobe Creative Cloud). His concern is that without instructors having a license to become familiar with it, they cannot help their students. Andrew explained that faculty can obtain a discounted license, but their department leader has to sign off on it. Also if student support is a concern, we have Adobe Ambassadors on campus to assist with training and support. Plans are underway to set up open office hours for them, using calendly for users to schedule a consultation with them. Oscar Keyes has student workers in The Workshop who can also assist.  Andrew mentioned several use cases that he could share (Dr. Hu in CHP is a good example) if needed to help faculty justify the departmental license purchase. Shanaka stressed that it’s still not enough for justification because the ones he mentioned are specific use cases. Andrew has other use cases and also suggested that faculty could use professional development as a justification.

Jon Becker shared that it is hard to tell the students to use these apps (which he does like) when faculty don’t have it.  

Andrew and Houston shared the link to the request form for faculty/departments.

Alex said that it sounds like the discounted cost of licenses for faculty/departments is still a barrier. Our first big step was removing the student cost and maybe we need to look into the faculty/department cost and what it would take to make it available to them at no cost. It could take years to address something like that, but it’s worth looking at. Our Provost is speaking at the annual Adobe conference and is really excited about promoting Adobe.

Adobe after Graduation
Shanaka expressed concern about students who graduate and lose their access. Is there a way to allow them an extension or conversion of their license for a period of time, between graduating and finding a job? If not, are their other applications they could use with the projects they created with Adobe? There are lots of open source and other tools out there, but what VCU has achieved with the new Adobe licensing is leveling the playing field for technology equity and giving students the opportunity to learn career-driven skills while they are enrolled. Andrew gave examples of other applications (i.e. AutoCad) that expire at graduation.

Promoting Student Use of Adobe
Houston spoke about his team’s role with managing the Adobe licensing, and feels that we need to get Adobe out there, in front of students by communicating it through the Student Technology Advisory Committee (STAC). We need to promote the use of Adobe and other technologies through the curriculum as part of the onboarding process for students. His team is looking at how licenses for students could be implemented differently to facilitate this.  Houston expressed a desire to join STAC, and Alex agreed to follow-up on this.

For Reference - Important Adobe Links

• VCU Website - go.vcu.edu/adobe
• Login to VCU Adobe - https://adobe.vcu.edu/sign-in/
• VCU Adobe blog - https://blogs.vcu.edu/adobe/
• Students:
  • license information and request form - go.vcu.edu/adobe/students
  • workshops & events - https://adobe.vcu.edu/learn/student-learning-hub/
• Employees
  • license information and request form - go.vcu.edu/adobe/employees
  • teaching resources - https://adobe.vcu.edu/learn/teaching-with-adobe/
  • self-paced training - https://adobe.vcu.edu/learn/linkedin-learning/
• Learn Adobe - go.vcu.edu/learn
• Get Help - https://adobe.vcu.edu/get-help
• VCU Showcase - https://adobe.vcu.edu/vcu-showcase/
• VCU Adobe Partnership News - https://adobe.vcu.edu/news/

Updates from Online Strategy Task Force

Near the end of the meeting Valerie expressed the importance of feedback for the task force report. She  asked the group to please review the report, and share feedback. Feedback Form Link

Election of a Vice Chair for 2022-23

At the end of the meeting, Valerie quickly mentioned that we need nominations for the Vice Chair position  vacated August 1st by Kristy Artello. She asked everyone to submit the nomination form, and if names are not submitted within the next few days she will start calling people.

Action Item: Nominations and election for Vice Chair position.

Agenda Items Not Covered

• Technology for hybrid meetings
• Reports from the working groups

Next Meeting: Monday, October 3 at 2:00-3:30 p.m. – Zoom

Meeting adjourned at 3:33 p.m.