Web Review staff survey

Well, the Web Review staff survey has finally been released. To recap, we're seeking views on how we need to develop both the intranet and internet to meet the needs of all our users in the future. We'll also be surveying and talking to students and external users of the website. The results of this survey work will inform our website strategy, and will be the launch point for more detailed one-on-one interviews.

http://web1.yorksj.ac.uk/Survey//TakeSurvey.asp?SurveyID=mM3l934L996KG

The responses I've had already are flagging up a general confusion about what is internet and what is intranet. What I've been saying is that the internet site is the external-facing website at www.yorksj.ac.uk and the intranet sites include the Staff Homepage, the Student Homepage, the Document Directory, the Staff Information Point; sites that require users to log in, or are not generally intended for the public. The rule of thumb I've always gone by is that inter- is between or amongst, and intra- is within; the internet is stuff for everyone and the intranet is just stuff for us staff. I managed to identify 38 distinct websites or microsites within our total web presence, however we describe it, and I hope we don't get too bogged down with worries about assigning the correct label -- it's all stuff that needs sorting, that needs pulling together. What all these sites provide is valuable, useful content; it's just that it is all so awkward to find, difficult to navigate through, hard to digest.

Here's a quick question to illustrate my point. The hefty Your Rights, Rules & Responsibilities guide book that we distribute to all the students at the start of their programme; that contains all the policies and contracts, the regs and procedures; that they read from cover to cover and internalise fully; an important document they might need to refer to at any point in their time with us — where's that on the web?

Stick a link in the comments if you think you know.

Brave new world

Here are two articles from the Guardian. As far as I can see, they weren't linked to each other, but it's quite fun to view them as a pair. A glimpse into the future?

Online-only business foundation degree to launch

The University of Essex and education and training provider Kaplan are this summer to launch a business studies foundation degree which is completed entirely online.
Debbie Andalo Link

It's a world of possibilities

Virtual campuses are springing up in Second Life, as universities discover the advantages of cyberspace.
Jessica Shepherd Link

We're in the middle of our semester two exam period at the moment. I love the idea that in the future our invigilators will all need 3D cyberspaced alter egos. But who's to say they've not got them already?

For those with a healthy first life, and have no idea what I'm on about, Second Life is "a 3-D virtual world entirely built and owned by its residents. Since opening to the public in 2003, it has grown explosively and today is inhabited by a total of 6,206,722 people from around the globe." Here's a cached copy of an FAQ from Oxford University on Second Life, with an academic angle, and here's a list of other institutions and organisations with an online presence there, and here's the obligatory link to Wikipedia.

It's that time of year again

It's that time of year again
Originally uploaded by YSJU Registry.

Email bankruptcy

I know, I know: this is hardly the most prolific of blogs out there, but I promise to try harder. So, to continue-

This caught my eye, from Double-Toungued Dictionary, "Slang, jargon, and new words from the fringes of English":

email bankruptcy

n. choosing to delete, archive, or ignore a very large number of email messages without ever reading them, replying to each with a unique response, or otherwise acting individually on them.
English, Online, Technology

Obviously we would never have anything to do with that kind of carry on here, but I thought it was a coincidence that I spotted this the day I'm trying to write up a little 'Getting the most out of Outlook' guide.

Now - headaches, coffee. The future - slick, efficient processes. Oh yes.

Friday headaches and coffee
Originally uploaded by YSJU Registry.

Another one of those full-day consultancy/training days that we know and love, this time with Ollie Magro and Howard Ormerod from Tribal, to get the ball rolling on the Process Manager project that will move the first of hopefully many off-line paper processes online, onto e:Vision.

I think it went quite well, and both Ken and I ended the day with a fuller understanding of the tools available, and how our existing process can map against their online templates. More training and consultancy booked in next month, with the aim of being able to deliver a working process in May. All good stuff.

"Students object to the changes on the UCAS application form"

This, from the Independent:

Students object to the changes on the UCAS application form

UCAS is planning to ask university applicants for more details of their background. Lucy Tobin reports

Published: 29 March 2007

The plan by UCAS, the university admissions service, to require applicants to record whether their parents went to university is deeply worrying to today's students. I probably wouldn't even be here under the proposed new admissions procedure," says Sara Carr, 21, an undergraduate at Cambridge University. "I went to a private school, both my parents went to university - and I'm middle class. I think it's terrible that, if I had applied via the new UCAS form, universities might allow my background to overshadow the A-levels I worked so hard for."

Continues...

And lots more here: http://news.google.co.uk/news?hl=en&ned=uk&ie=UTF-8&q=ucas+applicants+parents

AUA's code of professional standards

The Association of University Administrators (AUA), a professional body for higher education managers and administrators, has drawn up a code of professional standards that provides the framework of core values and principles to underpin the profession of university administration. I joined the AUA about a year ago, not that long after I started here, and found it a useful source of information on best practice across the sector on a range of issues. Their code of standards sums up quite nicely for me what's important, what it means to be a professional.

The code

This code of values and principles establishes the framework within which AUA expects its members to set the highest standards of professionalism. In order to demonstrate this professionalism and their commitment and contribution to higher education, AUA members are expected to:

• provide high quality professional services
  
• develop an appreciation of the academic culture, of the traditions and values of the organisations and institutions through which it is sustained, and of the roles of colleagues at all levels and in all branches of higher education
  
• be sensitive to the multiplicity of clients served by the higher education administrator and to the need to balance conflicting demands
  
• act with integrity, honesty, fairness, professional impartiality and diligence and without discrimination
  
• observe due care, objectivity and respect for confidentiality
  
• be explicit and straightforward in their dealings with colleagues and clients
  
• ensure that personal interest does not override the needs of clients
  
• accept responsibility for their actions
  
• challenge existing practices and ideas when necessary
  
• be committed to their own personal and professional development by seeking new knowledge and skills to enhance professional performance
  
• foster the development of others by sharing expertise and good practice and by encouraging employers to support professional development.

http://www.aua.ac.uk/about/code