Comments to the Reed Board of Trustees, September 25, 1999

Barbara Isgur, Steve McGeady, Reed Koch, Bob Gillespie, (Walter Mintz)

Observations, concerns and suggestions dealing with information technology issues and the Board of Trustees

Notes used by Bob Gillespie of consensus issues to present the summary of the group to the Board.

Introduction:

The recent Dedalus articles only cited information technology once: "Technology is adding a new element to overhead expense." A pungent observation in the 1967 Pierce Report by the President's Advisory Committee on Computers in Higher Education was "After growing wildly for years, the field of computing is approaching infancy." I use that again to open my 1982 report to NSF "Computing and Higher Education: An Accidental Revolution."

An group of trustees has been discussing informally both short range and long range issues, impact and strategy for information technology issues and Reed. The following are their consensus observations and assumptions.

Observations and Assumptions:

1.     We have diverse backgrounds, contradictory strategies and common concerns.

2.     Information Technology, not computing, is the issue. An specific example is that the new building planned will be named the Educational Technology Center and not the Computer Building as its real functions require people, support, insight. Remember Hamming's (Head of Bell Laboratories) words "The purpose of computing is not numbers but insight."

3.     Information technology use at Reed (and other liberal arts campuses) ranges from:

Administrative in support of the operations of the college including admissions, registration, financial, academic administration where the dollars expended can be weighed against other ways to perform the services such as hiring more staff. The Computing and Information Systems Department has a leadership role in developing and acquiring the applications and software that support those uses.

Research applications of computing are driven by the faculty and students in their uses for analysis, simulation, data bases, instrumentation, etc. The value is judged by the importance of the tool to the solution of the problems involved.

Instructional applications of computing are still emerging and is a challenging arena as it is driven by the individual instructor supported by the Computing and Information Systems Department with significant capital equipment required (workstations, projectors, software) and campus planning. Value is difficult to judge but improvements in the effectiveness of teaching are goals.

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4.     Reed has been recognized as a leader among liberal arts institutions and is viewed as outstanding among its peers. This is an interesting asset of the college that is considered important by potential students in consideration in choice of campuses.

5.     The information technology infrastructure (workstations, software, staff, network, etc.) exists to serve the campus mission(s)---faculty, administration, students---and does not stand alone.

6.     Significant planning issues dealing with information technology investments for the future are affected by such policy decisions as the plan for ten to one student to faculty ratio and other assumptions about growth. (For instance, addition faculty in the sciences will require significant investments for laboratory and computing support and other faculty, who might not have had such requirements in the past in humanities will now require those additional investments.

7.     Information technology is a key cultural element (no longer something just stuck to the President's shoe) which also serves as the last hope by many to stave off the capital expense of building new campuses to serve the growing population of students (through the arena of distance education). While Reed will not likely be involved with distance education it will be involved with collaboration which require significant support investments eventually.

8.     There is a concern that the issues of information technology affect both the long range planning issues as well as potential use by the Board itself. (I note that at least twenty five members of the board have email addresses.)

9.     Uneasiness that while information technology use seems to be growing as a percentage of the budget in our peer institutions but the budget percentage is flat at Reed.

10.  Information technology planning at Reed has been a visible faculty driven process at Reed through:

• The plan for personal computers in 1984 and the Grants from the Fred Meyer Trust and the Murdock foundation;

• The evaluation of the 1984 plan;

• The development laboratory (D-Lab) of the late '80ies;

• The Technology Advisory Committee;

• The emergence of the Technology Innovation Fund and its support;

• The recurring planning and interviews used to develop the long range plan and its regular revisions for Computing and Information Systems.

Recommendations:

1.     The Board of Trustees should do a little and talk a lot about the potential for information technology to supplement the current processes for getting out information to the Board by adding a email option to the current fax or hard copy. The Board should explore what peers are doing to take advantage of the world wide web to distribute information and to improve the effectiveness of its meetings.

2.     The Ad Hoc Group will pleased to continue to refine and identify opportunities, when it would be appropriate, to bring planning or policy issues to the Board or its committees.

3.     The focus should on leadership: What will it take (funds, plans, policies) for Reed to continue its leadership role in information technology? What will it gain?