Categories
Technology

Strategy Track 1 – Mobile Strategy

Mobile Strategy Panel:

  • August Alfonso, CIO, Del Mar College
  • Susan Kellogg, AVP & Deputy CIO, University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill
  • Santhana Naidu, Indiana State University

Susan Kellogg

  • First public institution
  • 29,000 students
  • $2.7 billion annual operating budget
  • $792.7 million total research funding for FY2014
  • What was needed in a mobile app
  • Student-led mobile app was led by:  Nikita Shamdasani, Diana Dayal, Matt Leming
  • Tech landscape:  highly decentralized funding environment, large MarCom and IT environments, also decentralized; WordPress CMS, 10,000 sites; Kurogo for centralized mobile app; Use of Adobe DPS is growing; 10 legacy mobile apps
  • We are looking at partnerships, especially with students, MarCom
  • Operational monitoring:  watch what’s happening and pull content that is not being used.  Update with seasonal information.
  • I’m a waterfall person, but I can see that agile is going to be the way forward (and I’m not totally comfortable with this!)

Santhana Naidu

  • Doctoral/Research in Terre Haute, IN
  • 13,200 students
  • First public university in IN to require a laptop
  • Mobile initiative started in 2010; native apps by OIT & mobile web by MarCom
  • Went back to the drawing board in Fall 2011; MarCom and OIT partnership with student feedback; Modo relationship
  • ISU Mobile:  over 25K downloads in 3 years
  • Popular modules:  courses, dining, map, email, directory
  • Primarily a marketing tool
  • OIT and MarCom partnership:  we meet quarterly to review analytics.
  • Governance is centralized and involves purchasing department
  • Lessons learned:  adoption of a user-centered design cycle; CMO vs. CIO partnership; finding the right mobile partner
  • Future:  mobile ubiquity and managing student expectations:  student services; RAVE guardian; audience segmentation; mobile ID/Digital wallet; geo-location based services; push messages; private app store

August Alfonso

  • Access to Excellence is the theme for Del Mar’s mobile strategy
  • Inspirations:  “we shutdown when we step into colleges or universities…we are fully well connected anywhere else” and “you all need to get your act together so we can get to what we need, when we want to, with our own devices”
  • BYOD Mobile Strategy:  VikingNet BYOD (4 devices per); Canvas – 100%  of credit/non-credit courses; Ask-The-Viking 24/7 online help; lecture capture within the LMS; Online Faculty Evaluation by Students; NEW mobile engine VikingGo
  • Del Mar MUST excel in online and mobile:  “you can carry Del Mar wherever you go”
  • VikingGo Mobile App:  Full Modolabs functionality; RAVE Alert; RAVE Guardian; Ask-the-Viking; Canvas LMS, et. al; alumni; Board meeting module; links to important resources

Panel Discussion

Susan:  how were mobile decisions made?  Who prioritized things?

August:  we had a mobile app we were about 11 months into when we decided to go to Modo.  Users were demanding more features than my staff could deliver using the existing solution.  We used analytics and asked students what they wanted.  We also asked our staff the same questions.

Santhana:  we have quarterly meetings with campus principals where we discuss prioritization of what needs to be done.   Items that affect student status are a high priority.

Susan:  speed is a challenge, and we need a way to maintain the student’s voice in all this.  We have a lot of customers who say that they’re boring, but important, and that leads to some interesting discussions about home page real estate.

Susan:  do you have plans to have multiple groups to maintain your content?  How do you plan to manage that?

August:  we look at the total student experience.  The heaviest investment is the mobile engine itself, so that decision has be gotten right the first time.

Santhana:  we rely on Modo to provide an extra hand in development when we don’t have the bandwidth to handle all the work.

Susan:  multi-tenant functionality will be important for us, and identifying the stewards of that associated content is probably even more important (content “ownership” can be challenging).

Santhana:  use of publisher in a multi-tenant

QUESTION:  How do you use analytics in your decision-making?

Susan:  we’re not doing much with performance right now.

August:  we’ve used analytics to keep an eye on our peak times.

Santhana:  we use Google Analytics

QUESTION:  How do you control who can create and manage an application?  What’s the life cycle for these apps, how do you manage it?

August:  IT/MarCom have to work closely to manage this.  Objectives need to be clearly identified before resources can be committed to a project.

Susan:  change in upper management at our university means that we don’t have a lot of entrenched views.  This has enabled us to “cheat a little bit” and move forward faster than we might have been able to in the past.

Categories
Technology

3 Minutes of Fame Presentations

Presenters:  representatives from participating Kurogo Institutions (each listed below)

This section of the conference was to provide participating institutions a platform for talking about what they’re doing.

Matt Willmore from Notre Dame

  • Launched with 15 modules in April of 2014
  • 3 new ones:  transit, campus IT, mobile printing
  • 22,000 downloads
  • Promoted at orientation
  • Evolving maps:  custom map icons, which came from Indiana State University (like ATMs)
  • Google Analytics
  • Student developers built the weather web cams and transit modules
  • Shuttle schedule
  • Popular features:  dining, map, athletics, webcams, photos.
  • Platforms:  iOS/Android native; mobile web; mobile tablet; desktop
  • What’s next?  Sakai

Paul Chenowith from Belmont University

 

  • Liberal arts institution in Nashville, TN
  • 7,200 students, music, health science, law school, and more
  • We’ve launched 2 apps in the last few months:  Modo for external, non-authenticated use
  • Tours and emergency notifications were big features for us, we also use convocations; myBelmont is a link to our authenticated services.
  • The directory is one our most-used features
  • Popular features:  Directory, Convo Events, Library, Course Search, myBelmont
  • Platforms:  iPhone native, Android native
  • What’s next?  Dining services (Sodhexo, we hope to do 2 upgrades per year, policies and procedures for management of overwhelming number of requests for new functionality)

Dan Liggett from CSU East Bay

 

  • Released in March 2015
  • What’s next:  grades (which we think will be our “killer app”), facilities, transit
  • Platforms:  mobile web, mobile web tablet, desktop

Kathryn Sharron from CSUN

 

  • Reputation and Visibility initiative just launched; new logo
  • About 58,000 students
  • Accessibility very important for us
  • Launched in August 2013 with 5 modules including enrollment
  • SoMe, photos, tour, additions feature for faculty/staff view, indoor maps, transit
  • Enrollment in classes is most popular module, and is easier to use than our PeopleSoft portal.
  • We allow students to pay, via a custom PeopleSoft web service to CashNet (which itself provides a mobile responsive view)
  • Top 4:  enroll in classes, map, dining

David from Colgate

 

  • GPS bus system, which we named “Colgate Cruiser” and worked with company called DoubleMap
  • Publisher is very popular (i.e. SPW or Spring Party Weekend, 13 days of Green were new modules which made quick updates by students very easy)
  • We have portal sign-on for our Banner system
  • Popular:  Cruiser, SPW, 13 days of green, courses, dining
  • Platforms:  iPhone native, Android native, mobile web, desktop
  • What’s next?  beefing up the infrastructure to handle bursts of heavy traffic.

Dan from Dallas County Community College District

  • About 80,000 students
  • We used to use Blackboard, which had a number of limitations that caused us to reevaluate our mobile platform choice
  • We had four IT people who Modo Labs basically spoon-fed us during the implementation
  • Most of the challenges were around how we would modify the app to support 7 different campuses (i.e. branding)
  • Student involvement has been a great experience for us
  • Popular:  Courses, Maps, eCampus, eConnect, myPortal
  • Platforms

Julie from Fitchburg State University

    • We’re located in Massachusetts
    • Been using for about 3 years, and it’s a great tool to aggregate information from many different sources (we don’t have a portal)
    • Adding more features as they become available.  Most recent one is courses, which is integrated with Blackboard.  we launched this last week.
    • What’s New:  laundry!  Integrating with LaundryView feed.  Student can select laundry facilities; it shows machine availability and cycle it’s on.
    • Popular:  Shuttles, admissions, athletics, tour, dining
    • Platforms:  Mobile web, mobile web tablet, desktop

Jeff Dillon from CSU Sacramento State

  • Using since 2012 (originally the free framework)
  • 28,000 total students
  • We have registrar module, which is by far the most-used module
  • 10,000 downloads total, 3,000 in first week; 75% iOS, 25% Android
  • Directory is very popular
  • We’re using Blackboard mobile learn
  • Dining / athletics are just links to mobile-aware sites
  • We’re still working on the governance
  • The registrar told us that our students really like the ability to see where the class is
  • We expected support issues with performance, but it worked out
  • Popular:  registrar, calendar, social, directory, campus map
  • Platforms:  iPhone native, Android native, mobile web
  • What’s next:  parking availability, role-based content, CashNet payment integration

Michelle from West Chester, Pennsylvania

    • 16,000 students, new branch campus in Philadelphia
    • Recently made our web site responsive
    • About 1,000 views / day
    • Integrating D2L (Desire to Learn) module, 25Live calendar module
    • Popular:  email, buses, directory, academic calendar, news
    • Platforms:  iOS, Android, mobile web, mobile web tablet, desktop
    • What’s next:  RSS feed integration

 

 

Bob from Modo Labs, schools not represented at the conference

      • New tools from Modo coming soon:  customer portal UI, forums, FAQs
      • College of William and Mary:  springboards
      • Harvard Shoestring Strategies:  financial literacy module.  It’s all put together with Publisher.
      • Villanova School of Business:  publisher-based application with templates and push notifications.
      • Barnard College:  publisher
      • Emerson College:  uses portlets as home screen, which allows them to completely customize the view; they also use resource availability module to show their library’s computer lab availability.
      • Masdar Institute:  UAE-based college, uses facilities module.  It uses authentication to present personalized information.
      • Rhode Island School of Design:  one of the top design schools in the country.  They independently theme every single thing they do, which reflects the flexibility of the Kurogo platform.
      • Sacramento State:  launching 2.3 soon, with favoriting feature and maps.

 

 

Categories
Technology

What’s the Point?

Presenters:

  • Melissa Harts, Dean of Institutional Technology, Pasco-Hernando State College
  • Mark Tennyson is PHSC project lead

Resources:

PHSC is new to mobile, we launched last August, started collecting data in October.  We have five campuses with about 16,000 students.  We are a community college system in Florida, and we recently started offering Baccalaureate degrees.  Mobile has helped transform our processes.  Our online program is growing at a double-digit rate, with students in every state in the United States.

Transformation

  • How do we use the mobile app to create a sense of community in this changing environment?
  • CHANGES:  community > State college; adding bachelor’s degrees; new campus; changing deans of institutional tech (me!); new systems app dev; upcoming retirement of president; increase of online courses

Why Mobile?  Why modo?

  • Two-pronged decision:  going mobile was partly “pre-decided” by a management committee.
  • Our matrix selection criteria:  met needs of focus group, admin panel, analytics to measure success, interoperable with current systems, admin portal with different permission roles, end-user support, mobile web included, and of course price.
  • There was always a certain amount of doubt in my mind about whether they would be able to support our needs.
  • 80% of colleges and university respondents use or are planning to use mobile apps for teaching.

Vision:  Initial Goals

  • One dimensional goal:  build a mobile app!

Vision:  Current

  • Functional on all devices
  • Wanted to reflect our transformation from 2 to 4 year college and growth, community (HS to alumni), excellence, campus safety, and more.

Challenges

  • Infrastructure
  • Resources:  all hands on deck!
  • Timing:  this growth phase of our campuses was the best time for us do this.
  • Awareness:  students couldn’t find an app for our campus (because it didn’t exist!)
  • Perception:

Mobile app project

  • Project schedule:  rapid development of 16-17 weeks
  • Implementation Strategy (pilot release, refinements)
  • Official launch was August 2014.  We embedded the launch into existing communication channels, NOT a standalone app.
  • Took feedback from a variety of channels, including a module and surveys.

Feedback:  What’s the Point?

  • One student’s feedback asked this question
  • App has to engage the student

Data Drill Down:  Measuring Success

  • Users:  Accessed by 20% of core user community
  • Top Modules:  mail, cal, eLearning, Directory, Courses, News
  • Keyword searches:  WISE (SIS), myPHSC (Canvas/LMS); people, events, academic dates, courses; financial related queries; graduation, grades
  • Average Time Users Stay:  full college web site:  4:00 minutes; mobile site:  2:05 minutes

Where do we go from here?

  • Integration of SIS
  • Think of new ways to engage our students
  • Think of new ways to engage our staff, faculty, alumni, applicants, 1st time students
  • Create a community of Learners
  • Show this is a valuable tool to strengthen the community

Looking Forward:  Concerns

  • Keep  users interested
  • Keep pace with needs
  • Awareness of college needs
  • Leadership:  support and keep the mobile app viable
  • New IT staffing needs

Conclusion

  • How do we use the mobile app to create a sense of community in this changing environment?
  • Embrace transformation
  • Learn from your community
  • Immerse yourself into their business
  • Transform your mindset and think about their role and needs
  • Be willing to accept criticism and grow from it
  • Develop a strategy that is inclusive of a NEEDS assessment, not a WANTS assessment

 

 

Categories
Technology

What’s New In Kurogo

Presenters:

  • Eric Kim:  VP User Experience, Modo Labs
  • Marshall Vale:  VP Engineering, Modo Labs

Kurogo Mobile Campus:  What a Year!

  • 3 major releases (2.1, 2.2, 2.3)
  • 20+ packages released
  • Major work at every level of the tech & product

What’s new for End Users?

  • New map module features pathfinding, which uses data from either google maps or campus ArcGIS data.  Does turn-by-turn navigation.
  • Tour 2.0:  maps, curated linear paths, with ability to skip stops.  Allows multiple layers of information.  Card-based photos.  Friendlier browser-based management tools for non-technical administrators has drag-n-drop content editing that dynamically adjusts the map routing.
  • Indoor maps.  This is driven in large part by our corporate customers, but is frequently requested by our .edu customers.  Find nearest items of interest such as fire escapes, accessibility, info of interest such as A/V in room.
  • Native tablet apps.  Split views, native OS controls like iOS popovers, sign-in / sign-out, Android ActionBar control, etc.
  • Favorite modules:  loss of customized layout.  With 2.3, users can “promote” modules they use the most.  These items are shown in a “My Favorite Modules” section at the top of the main page.
  • Facilities (Report a Problem):  allows creation of tickets.
  • Resources Module:  availability of resources such as laundry facilities (integration with a system I didn’t catch).  It connects to a number of different structured data, and can be used by computer labs.
  • Performance improvements:  ON THE SERVER:  improved data-source fetching, parsing, and caching; faster HTML sanitization; cache priming on every deploy; faster HTML generation and minification.  ON THE DEVICE:  more granular, persistent, and intelligent client-side caching, AJAX-loaded in-app notification banners for more cachable pages, native app asset cache (requires 2.3 server and apps)
  • Federated search now included publisher content
  • Typographic improvements to aid readability
  • Ongoing accessibility updates and improvements
  • Many visual updates and refinements
  • More diversity of content presentation via Publisher
  • More robust theming
  • Comprehensive theming documentation
  • Webfonts (support for Google fonts, Adobe TypeKit, Uploaded font files
  • Fonts will appear across all platforms, including native apps (aside from navbar & navmenu)
  • Publisher Templates:  more flexible and attractive

What’s New for Administrators?

  • Redesign KPM for more flexibility during dev lifecycle
  • Shopping cart model allows you to select packages before install
  • Introduces provider types (git, github, packages).  Github is now a first-class citizen within Kurogo.
  • Package Manager 2:  new channels for stable, beta and dev status; can change permissions to only show subset of channels; can change provider type; new Package Server
  • Admin Roles:  additional role types; can now restrict a user’s role to all modules, module instance, module type; Example:  can limit a user to only edit a single Publisher module
  • List Filter:  accelerator for finding matching items in long lists of components; enabled for data sources, modules, and services
  • List Sorting:  select column to sort asc/desc; available in most areas of Admin with a table list; works with filter by
  • Deploy Changes:  new in progress status for data sources, modules, and authentication authorities; limits deploying to only Edit and Test targets; limits deploying to only edit and test targets; allows changes to be made to production without deploying unfinished modules; can deactivate modes.
  • Additional:  New job worker queue handles many background tasks (2.2), mail service provider for forms (2.1), published status indicator for edit pages; edit UI; new inspector assist in Edit; UI created for many settings which required Advanced Config; Sharing settings config; additional access to server status info & logs

What’s New for Developers?

  • Documentation:  thorough update of kurogo core docs for 2.3, class hierarchies;
  • Lots of objects!
  • Package Manager 2:  new meta-data info in the package format; stable, beta, dev status; more detailed minimum and maximum version dependencies
  • Additional improvements:  parse map types; AJAX flash message support; Custom URL Parameters in Data Models & Objects (bookmarks for aggregate feeds)

What’s Next?

  • Self service & Enhanced App Assembly
  • Quick theme builder:  rapidly change your Kurogo app’s overall theme via the Admin panel; simplified options streamlines the process; builder auto-computes and sets 500+ theme variable from a few settings; 6 color schemes; primary and secondary brand colors; Serif, Sans, or Custom fonts; Upload a logo.
  • Marshall gave a quick demonstration of what the Quick Theme Builder can do
  • Focus on self service:  full theme editor, fine grained modification of theme variables and asset files; more data sources will allow file upload for situations where live data source available, i.e. CSV for Calendar; improving navigation management; portlet management
  • Longform,” a new much more flexible, more modular content focused template
  • Capabilities:  indoor maps (custom amenities, detail screens for amenities, feed support for POI and amenity data); Direct alerts; import/export of Edit content; duplication of Edit content; Banner ads (promote events and activities around campus); Tighter integration between Indoor Maps, Outdoor Maps and Facilities
Categories
Technology

Mobile Trends

Presenter:  Andrew Yu, Founder and CTO of Modo Labs (@kurogofwk)

Andrew came from MIT, working on the mobile platform there.

We expect students to have more than one mobile device these days, and they have big expectations.  How do we meet those expectations?  Slide showed an arrow pointing up…i.e., things are going up:  bigger, more, faster, smarter, (hopefully) cheaper.

Network Side

The question is no longer Can you hear me now?  but Can you see me now?  All major carriers have rolled out 4G tech, especially LTE.  Mobile speeds where LTE is available is often faster overall than WiFi!  So, the world has moved “up” in the realm of speed.  There is also more competition among carriers…Google is even in the game.  5G will come sometime, probably in the 2020s…I think we can look to the Tokyo Olympic games for the first public implementations.

Faster Network = Better App Experience

Google Maps now defaults to satellite photo view instead of a plain map view.

Devices

“No One is Going to Buy a Big Phone”  – Steve Jobs

Well, that’s not true, and of course Apple now offers the iPhone 6 Plus.  Unlike phones / phablets, tablet growth is slowing…it’s currently at single-digit growth numbers worldwide.  Wearables are now a part of the ecosystem, and it’s worth exploring what these devices are capable of so we can deliver functionality to them.

Low energy bluetooth (iBeacons) are something to consider as well.  iBeacons can do push and proximity-based notifications, which is useful in tours, treasure hunts, vendor coupons, etc.  For campuses like Notre Dame with lots of interesting locations, this would be great for a tour app.

NFC

Mobile payments, physical access, Google Wallet, etc.  This will be important for implementation of campus OneCard systems.  Higher Ed is a prime vertical for this sort of integration.  Georgetown University is doing a Proof Of Concept for student ID, which includes two factor authentication (photo, QR code, more).

World is Becoming Mobile Friendly

Google Mobilegeddon:  search “Golf”  The world is being forced in some ways to be mobile-friendly.  If your site is not mobile-friendly, it will be indexed as well particularly for mobile searches.  Check here to see if your web site is mobile friendly:  https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/mobile-friendly/

Are We Done?  We’re Just Getting Started

Demographics are changing.  Our survey indicates that mobile applications are prioritized for:  1) current students, 2) new students and 3) prospective students.

Features to Consider:  Mobile Engagement

  • Customized UX
  • In-app social
  • Share pictures and videos (leverage existing SoMe channels)
  • Push notifications (not just for emergencies)
  • Anonymous messaging?
  • New Student Orientation and Move-in day

Global Audience

For international students, your mobile app is often the ONLY experience a potential student will have before setting foot on your campus.  Consider how you are reaching your various audiences – they use different modes.

Mobile Apps – More and Easier

There is an app for that > Many apps mode.

  • Unbundling phenomenon:  intentionally  and hopefully useful.
  • Apps are broken out into separate functions (Facebook and Messenger, FourSquare and Swarm, etc.)
  • Harvard has a mobile campus app, but also Tour, Financial literacy, and hospital apps.
  • Challenge with unbundling and the “many apps” strategy is that there can be confusion about which app is “official”
  • App discovery & distribution is a way to help get a handle on the many apps strategy.  Apperian is a vendor that has a product to help this.

Easier to Make, Maintain, and Share

  • With Kurogo, you can now assign many different module tasks to specific departments, i.e. embedding responsive web pages, new student orientation application, updating emergency contacts

Mobile Mind Shift!

  • Consider “micro moments” and the “mobile mind shift.”  Example quickly update / refine processes like personal calendaring.  Casual and quick updates.
  • Google Now is a great example of this “mobile mind shift”
  • “Mile IQ” is another example:  it’s an app that allows you to manage your mileage for IRS reporting.
  • Notre Dame’s “o’Snap” provides Uber-like functionality that allows students to summon a cart for travel on campus.

Transforming the University Experience

  • Think Mobile
  • Engage
  • Personalize

 

 

 

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