On March 13, 2020, President Cassels issued a response to the COVID-19 global pandemic and announced a transition away from face-to-face instruction and an immediate need to modify the university’s operation.
University Systems has been an integral part of this change and has worked tirelessly to support the campus community. Resources were deployed and decisions were made to implement new tools to support remote working, online teaching, and transitioning student support services online, while maintaining all of the existing information systems relied on for the continued operations of the University. Using decisive action, University Systems implemented a number of new tools and technologies, and continues to work on emerging issues, such as cybersecurity and operational priorities.
As the first week of the summer term comes to a close, a host of new and innovative services have been rolled out to support faculty, staff and students. Everyday, we are inspired by the hard work of all of the University Systems team and look forward to continuing to improve and expand upon our existing services.
Remote Work Resources
Working from home guidelines published by the University of Victoria provide guidance to employees in maintaining physical distancing requirements while supporting the delivery of University services. University Systems Remote work resources provides a comprehensive listing of services available that enable faculty and staff to perform tasks from off-campus locations.
University Systems staff have been configuring desktops and laptops for the more than 3500 supported clients who have now transitioned successfully to working remotely, including approximately 80 brand new devices in the past month. Systems staff continue to find ways to support their clients remotely, as use of the remote support tool increased over 500% with more than 1000 sessions initiated in the month of April.
A number of additional core services are seeing a dramatic increase in use:
- The VPN service has become a foundational requirement to provide secure access to University resources while working remotely, and now sees a peak daytime usage of 1650 concurrent users, and increase of more than 500% from previous highs.
- Nearly 1200 faculty and staff have started using the Skype for Business service for instant messaging and ad hoc and scheduled video conferencing since early March, with over 1500 users now on the service. Peak daytime usage is now 1150 concurrent users, up from an average of 450 users prior to the transition to working remotely.
- The Remote Desktop service provides a secure and compatible environment for accessing UVic systems and applications while working from home for those who may not have a compatible workstation. Additional infrastructure capacity has been added to support the more than 400 users who have now adopted this service, a tenfold increase from the previous averages.
Supporting Online Teaching
On April 6, 2020, and announcement was made to the campus regarding the upcoming availability of a series of new tools to support online teaching, all of which required an expedited implementation schedule which meant balancing the need for privacy, security, and long-term supportability while acknowledging the requirement to provide access to instructors as soon as possible to enable time to prepare for instruction in a new mode for the summer term. University System teams led the work to enable access to each of these technology platforms.
Zoom Pilot
Zoom is an enterprise solution for video communication and real-time collaboration that is ideal for large group meetings. UVic has acquired a campus-wide license for faculty, staff and students, and Single Sign On (SSO) has been implemented in order to allow users to login with their Netlink ID and passphrase and take advantage of institution-wide settings to support privacy and security requirements while maintaining ease of use. Additional information about the availability and features of the Zoom service, as well as support options are available on the Zoom Service Catalogue and Zoom Help Resources sections of the University Systems website.
Microsoft Teams
A team of more than 20 subject matter experts from across University Systems worked together to accelerate the implementation and rollout of Microsoft 365 services, starting first with Microsoft Teams to provide a platform for communication and collaboration in record time. Initial configuration began in early April, with rapid implementation continuing through the month to the first courses being provisioned in time for the start of the summer term in the first week of May. Existing infrastructure to support sign-up and manage required consent options has been leveraged to create a seamless onboarding experience, and comprehensive documentation about new and expanding functionality continues to evolve on a daily basis.
Kaltura
Kaltura is an enterprise solution for campus-wide media management, allowing instructors to capture and share videos with their students to deliver high quality video to any device. Integration of the Kaltura system with CourseSpaces was completed on Friday, May 1, 2020 and within 5 days more than 375 instructional videos were uploaded to the system to support the delivery of courses for the Summer term.
Supporting Students
To coincide with the transition to online teaching for the summer term, additional and augmented services for students have also been rolled out, resulting in many extra hours of dedicated work by University Systems to maintain existing support levels and quickly roll out some new services.
Online Exam Support
University Systems worked closely with the Division of Learning, Teaching, Support, and Innovation (LTSI) to support the University’s transition to online learning for the remainder of the Winter term by supporting the completion of 727 time-limited and take-home exams with 50508 exam submissions between March 16, 2020 and April 27, 2020 within the CourseSpaces Learning Management System. Exams were carried out over extended time periods requiring additional out of hours monitoring and support by the team to ensure the system remained stable and responsive.
Remote Lab Service
A remote lab service has been developed to allow instructors to book and reserve access to computing facilities that can be securely accessed by students who are working remotely from their personal computers to access UVic-licensed or specialized software. This service will provide valuable access for students required to complete course work at no additional cost, and serve as a substitute for in-person bookings in the computing facilities that would traditionally have occurred for on-campus course offerings.
Grading Options
In response to revised grading options for students for the spring term, the team worked quickly to create a brand new application to enable students to easily record their grading method choices based upon their existing enrollments. The new application also allows for administrative staff to distribute email confirmation messages once choices are recorded, keeping students up to date on the progress of their grade revisions. In the first week since the application was launched, several hundred grading decisions have been recorded.