Campus Profile: University of California/Berkeley Copyright 1994 CAUSE. From _CAUSE/EFFECT_ Volume 17, Number 3, Fall 1994. Permission to copy or disseminate all or part of this material is granted provided that the copies are not made or distributed for commercial advantage, the CAUSE copyright and its date appear, and notice is given that copying is by permission of CAUSE, the association for managing and using information resources in higher education. To disseminate otherwise, or to republish, requires written permission. For further information, contact Julia Rudy at CAUSE, 4840 Pearl East Circle, Suite 302E, Boulder, CO 80301 USA; 303-939-0308; e-mail: jrudy@CAUSE.colorado.edu CAMPUS PROFILE This article is based on a visit to the University of California, Berkeley campus by editor Julia Rudy. The Campus Profile department of _CAUSE/EFFECT_ regularly focuses on the information resources environment of a CAUSE member institution, to promote a better understanding of how information resources are organized, managed, planned for, and used in colleges and universities of various sizes and types. UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, BERKELEY For the first fifty years of the life of the University of California, beginning in 1868, Berkeley was its only general campus. Today, UC Berkeley is one of nine campuses in the UC system. With 30,000 students, a distinguished faculty, and nearly 300 degree programs in fourteen colleges and schools, Berkeley continues to build on its strong foundation of academic excellence and student diversity. "WORKING TOGETHER" APPROACH Although Berkeley has long been renowned for independently building "towers of excellence" in a highly decentralized academic environment, in recent years a combination of state budget reductions and the leadership of Chancellor Chang-Lin Tien has prompted an approach that emphasizes the need to work together to solve the challenges facing the University. A major catalyst for this approach was the establishment 2-1/2 years ago of the Academic Planning Board (APB) to encourage faculty and administrators to work together, rather than independently, enabling a true shared governance structure. What makes the APB unique, and highly effective, is the mandated equal representation of faculty and administrators participating on this board. Indicative of the importance of information resources and technology at Berkeley is the inclusion on the APB of Associate Vice Chancellor for Information Systems and Technology Jack McCredie and the University Librarian[1] (along with all vice chancellors and key Faculty Senate members). Meeting every other week throughout the academic year, the APB reviews the long-range plans of all academic and administrative units, sets priorities for the campus, and makes recommendations regarding these units to the chancellor. Temporary review panels are formed to examine specific issues. For example, last year the APB's Working Group on Administration and Support created panels to recommend ways to improve the effectiveness of administration and support services in six areas, among them instructional technology, financial management systems, and administrative architecture.* In doing so, the working group acknowledged that Berkeley must "make capital and human resources investments in the modernization of communications and information systems ... and lever its investment in the completed [campus-wide] network by developing new management information systems that deliver redesigned, streamlined, paperless or paper-limited administrative processes that improve service and quality, reduce costs, and simplify procedures." This philosophy strongly echoes the principles established in a report published in 1991 by the UC Office of the President, _Sustaining Excellence in the 21st Century_,[2] which has influenced Berkeley and other campuses in the system to look toward information technology to help restructure administration. CENTRAL IT PLANNING, ORGANIZATION AND SERVICES The mission of Berkeley's Information Systems and Technology (IST) division, led by McCredie, is to "help all departments at the University of California, Berkeley make effective and innovative use of the full range of communication and computing technologies to accomplish their missions in the best and most cost-effective ways." IST is made up of eleven service centers: Administrative Systems Department, Central Computing Services, Data Communication and Network Services, Instructional Technology Program, Museum Informatics Project, Social Science Computing Laboratory, Strategic Technology Planning, Student Information Systems, Telecommunications, Workstation Support Services, and the office of the Associate Vice Chancellor for IST. McCredie reports to Vice Chancellor for Research Joseph Cerny, but as a leading member of the Campus Computing and Communications Policy Board (CCCPB), he also has a close working relationship with Chancellor Tien. The CCCPB, with a makeup similar to the APB, provides high-level policy and administrative guidance on broad issues of computing and communications policy, administration, and financial support. A subcommittee of the CCCPB on Administrative and Student Support Services is charged with examining computing needs and priorities for administrative and student support units. A new Instructional Technology subcommittee is also being formed, in response to the recommendations of the APB instructional technology panel. This panel recommended that a permanent campus-wide committee be appointed to ensure stronger policy, planning, and oversight of instructional technology and to address such issues as the need for an instructional technology center at Berkeley and stable funding sources to support faculty initiatives. IST spent considerable time during the past year defining its vision for the next five years. The resulting document, _Toward Electronic Scholarly Information_, was presented to and approved by the APB, the Faculty Senate Committee on Computing and Communications, and the CCCPB.* Six major objectives were identified: (1) develop the campus networking infrastructure (data, voice, and video); (2) establish a rich set of online information resources and services; (3) expand the use of information technology in learning and instruction; (4) redesign crucial administrative and student information systems; (5) develop and support a comprehensive distributed computing environment; and (6) provide support and access to national high performance computing centers. The document also articulated the need to invest in "strategic partnerships, new management procedures and systems, and support for faculty, staff, and students" so that they can use the electronic infrastructure more effectively. To meet this need, and to adjust to significant budget reductions, McCredie has been working toward rationalizing functions within IST for the past year: "We have been essentially 'reorganizing on the margin'--making logical and obvious changes to fill voids and consolidate services, using strategic directions to reshape staff placements and responsibilities." Having made these marginal changes, IST will begin to address a more substantial restructuring in the coming year. One step in this direction was the recent creation within IST of the Strategic Technology Planning unit. Staff in this unit will work closely with deans, vice chancellors, and other senior campus managers to help plan their IT activities, identify strategic opportunities, and work effectively with IST to realize those plans. The input gathered by staff in the new strategic planning unit will, in turn, help IST make sure its priorities are aligned with those of campus academic and business leaders. In addition, IST is evaluating techniques such as the "structural cybernetics" approach of N. Dean Meyer used by the University of Wisconsin-Madison's Division of Information Technology in a recent similar effort. Like most research universities, much of the computing power at Berkeley is distributed across desktops in the form of microcomputers and Unix workstations. IST's Workstation Support Services provides campus-wide support for the more popular brands in the form of sales and service, software distribution, consulting, and training. Among academic units, electrical engineering and computer science, business administration, chemistry, physics, engineering, and many others have extensive departmental computing facilities, including highly specialized computing labs. Centrally, IST maintains and services eleven general microcomputer facilities, many of which were upgraded in the past year and most of which increasingly employ student help. IST's Central Computing Services supports an IBM 3090 MVS/ESA system used to manage major administrative application systems, as well as IBM VM/CMS and various Unix systems for general academic use. Data Communication and Network Services is responsible for designing and operating the campus-wide TCP/IP data network, which has more than 16,000 nodes, while the Telecommunications service unit supports the campus's 16,500-line voice communications network. RETHINKING ADMINISTRATIVE SYSTEMS In a report to the APB earlier this year, the panel charged with evaluating Berkeley's administrative architecture recommended that the University define what it believes is the best administrative structure for its needs, paying special attention to four types of administrative rationalization: increased devolution, i.e., alleviation of central overregulation through enhanced information systems; selected clustering of functions or units; improved communication and coordination across units; and more strategically oriented resource allocation. The administrative architecture panel worked in parallel with the panel on financial management systems, which was charged with making recommendations for a financial management system that will replace Berkeley's thirty-year-old general ledger system and meet campus-wide needs well into the future. Staff of the financial systems project spent nine months interviewing departments to determine needs and evaluate business processes, issued an RFP this spring, and expect to award a contract this fall. In addition to this project, two other initiatives under the auspices of the University's Business and Administrative Services are under way, a payroll/personnel project and an automated employment process. An RFP is being prepared for a comprehensive human resource management system based on the recently reengineered employment processs. In all of these initiatives, the "owners" of the processes are the drivers of the projects, with IST's Administrative Systems Department unit functioning as a technical partner. Coherence is provided by the oversight of the Berkeley Administrative Initiatives Coordinating Group, who meet monthly with key players to ensure communication and information sharing across the University's business processes and systems. Associate Chancellor Jim Hyatt, Berkeley's chief budget and planning officer, and McCredie co-chair this committee. Similarly, IST's Student Information Systems unit has worked closely with Admissions and Enrollment at Berkeley to improve student services. SIS is in the process of implementing a degree audit report system (DARS, from Miami University of Ohio), as well as a series of systems that allow students easier access to information. Tele-BEARS and Info-BEARS use touch-tone phone technology to allow students to enroll in classes and access final grades, financial aid, and other information. A new service called Bear Facts--Berkeley's version of the Mandarin System developed at Cornell University--will provide access to data not currently accessible, and allow data viewing, print-out of selected data, and correction of student address information. Since 1991, Student Information Systems has been publishing a plan that identifies the long-range directions and strategies for student systems at Berkeley.* With the University's highly decentralized approach to computing, this kind of central coordination and leadership has been key to leveraging campus resources and to effectively delivering automated information and services. IST's Administrative Systems Department is also working toward implementing a "Berkeley Information System" to enable decision-making at the lowest appropriate campus levels and to provide management information for executive support. Major system processes to be delivered initially will include capturing and storing data from production applications systems in one data repository, accessible to users trained in query tools, report writers, and client interface tools; editing and transforming data to generate management information; and accessing and using management information through graphical user interfaces. While information technology is viewed as a key ingredient in administrative changes at Berkeley, its ability to enhance scholarship is also recognized. According to Carol Christ, recently named to the new, consolidated Vice Chancellor and Provost position, "Information technology enables an extraordinary efficiency, speed of communication, and access to information. It has already transformed research and has potential to profoundly change scholarly publication and the way the library provides access to scholarly information." Those changes are occurring rapidly at Berkeley, thanks to effective collaboration between IST and the library. [MODEL NOT AVAILABLE IN ASCII TEXT VERSION] NETWORKED INFORMATION RESOURCES: FERTILE GROUND FOR COLLABORATION Two years ago, there were 8,000 nodes on Berkeley's campus data network, each paying a monthly service fee. Today, the service charge has been eliminated; network use is free after an initial connection charge; and there are now 16,000 nodes on the network, with more than 4,000 connections expected in the next year. The goal is universal connectivity. According to McCredie, this rapid expansion of the campus-wide network has had a tremendous impact on how work is accomplished at Berkeley: "The first thing people do in a committee meeting is share their e-mail addresses. It's just become the way people communicate." IST encouraged connection to and use of the network by implementing a universal e-mail system (UCLink) and, together with the library and other departments, making a wealth of information resources available online. Gopher and Mosaic have become popular tools on campus, with a top-level Gopher server (gopher.berkeley.edu) that provides access to other campus Gopher servers. One of these, Infocal, offers general campus information--class schedules, faculty and staff directory, job listings, and so forth--while another, InfoLib, provides general library information. Campus users can access not only Berkeley's online catalog, GLADIS, but also MELVYL, a computer-based library system representing 12 million holdings of all the libraries in the nine-campus UC system. Recent usage statistics indicate more than 750,000 searches of MELVYL per week from users around the world. According to the IST five-year vision, a key strategic objective is to work closely with the library, University museums, and academic and administrative departments to establish a "rich set of online information resources and services that will make local and international scholarly and administrative resources readily available over the network." Included in those information resources are institutional data fundamental to the operation of the campus such as current financial status or purchasing accounts payable, academic records such as student transcripts or grades, historical data representing operation of the institution over time, and general day-to-day information about campus life. The campus libraries are working with IST to ensure that scholarly information resources such as academic and research data, papers, books, and image and audio collections can be made available online, and to develop standards and models for the access and presentation of this rich array of knowledge. Especially notable is the Museum Informatics Project, a collaborative effort to coordinate the application of information technology in museums and other organized, non-book collections at Berkeley. A service unit of IST, the project works collaboratively with the library, faculty, collections managers, and curators "to develop data models, system architectures, and demonstration systems as bases for coordinated and integrated approaches to the application of information technology." According to Associate University Librarian Susan Rosenblatt, "For twenty years we've focused on automating the back room. That's been helpful, but now we are trying to deemphasize development of the processing end and focus most of our attention on the access and navigation end." McCredie and former University Librarian Dorothy Gregor both served on the task force that proposed a new School of Information Management and Systems last year (see sidebar). The IST five-year vision predicts that within that timeframe, the routine operation of the campus and its academic and research programs will be changed fundamentally. The success and speed of that transition will depend on the ability of IST and the library to lead the campus in the development and uses of online information resources. ******************************************************* SIDEBAR University of California, Berkeley's School of Information Management and Systems An early retirement program, with consequent decreases in both administrative and faculty positions, has enabled significant rethinking and restructuring to occur in both administrative and academic areas at Berkeley. The University's new School of Information Management and Systems is a prominent example of the effectiveness of the collaborative process fostered by the Academic Planning Board. The new professional school was proposed by a task force that engaged representatives from Berkeley's business school, law school, engineering college (including computer science), public policy, journalism, and the University's library and information systems and technology organizations in a highly collaborative effort. Following are excerpts from the group's "Proposal for a School of Information Management and Systems," which has since been accepted by the University.* A search is currently under way for a dean to take on the challenge of leading the new school. "We propose a program that will advance, through teaching and research, the organization, management and use of information and information technology, and enhance our understanding of the impact of information on individuals, institutions, and society. ... The primary educational mission of the program will be to prepare professionals for corporations, government agencies, and the academic world who can develop improved approaches to handling information, to design and manage information functions, and to merge them with other aspects of the organizations. ... The research mission of the program will be to explore the design and operation of information systems and services, the nature and properties of information, and information-related behavior at the individual, group, and societal levels. There currently exists no academic structure--at Berkeley or elsewhere--of the specific sort that we are proposing. What is unique about this program is the focus on the use and management of information through the merger of the technical and social sciences approaches ... It is estimated that private industry is now spending $11 billion a year on investment in new information technologies, that half of U.S. Capital Investment is in information technology (Business Week), and that 40 percent of U.S. exports are intellectual property (Wall Street Journal), but as yet there is no professional school in the U.S. that concentrates on the management and design of these resources. The proposed school has as its focus the organization, management and use of information and information systems, operating at the interface between information technology, producers of information, and users of information. The School will graduate professionals who are highly sought by corporations and government operations covering a wide variety of areas. Libraries are among the employers, but are not dominant. ... The degree to be awarded by the program ... is not designed to meet American Library Association requirements; rather, it will serve as a model for the development of accreditation criteria for the emerging discipline upon which the School is focused." ******************************************************* *The following documents referenced in this article have been contributed to the CAUSE Information Resources Library: _Instructional Technology at the University of California Berkeley_ (CSD0933); _Administrative Architecture Coordination, Communication, Collaboration _(CSD0931); _Financial Management Systems_ (CSD0925); _Toward Electronic Scholarly Information: The IST Five Year Vision _(CSD0932); _Student Systems Computing Plan for 1993-1997_ (CSD0924); and _Proposal for a School of Information Management Systems_ (CSD0926). For ordering information, phone 303-939-0310 or e- mail orders@cause.colorado.edu ==================================================== Footnotes: 1 Dorothy Gregor recently retired from this position. A new University Librarian will be appointed this fall. 2 This document was published as CAUSE Professional Paper #8. For ordering information, e-mail orders@cause.colorado.edu or phone 303-939-0310. ==================================================== Campus Profile: University of California/Berkeley