Policies & Procedures

Pilot and/or purchase of academic technologies

When a technology or software is identified for pilot or purchase, it must first be determined if the product is specific to a department or college or if it would serve a greater institutional need or purpose.

Department/College specific technologies

If the technology is department or college specific, pilot funding should first be requested at the department or college level. The DEC and IT will collaborate to make a small pool of funds available to support the pilot of technologies if the department/college is willing to contribute half of the pilot costs. These funds will be available on a first come, first served basis and shall not exceed $1,000 per pilot. The DEC and IT will seek counsel from the faculty senate Academic Technology Committee in regards to the funding of pilots. Pilot funds will also be contingent to a signed agreement with the faculty member to assess the piloted product and to share assessment results as well as findings and recommendations with both the DEC and IT.
IT will support the installation of pilot software and will aid, as possible, in the implementation of the technology associated with a pilot.
The DEC will assist with the use of piloted technologies and personnel allows.
If a department/college specific technology is selected for purchase, the department and/or college will be required to provide funding for the purchase. Funding requests may also be extended for ETF or Academic Affairs funds.
IT and the DEC will make every effort to support the purchase and implementation of the technology, but will not be able to guarantee training or product maintenance and these details must be discussed with IT and the DEC as part of the purchasing process.

University wide technologies

Technologies deemed to meet a greater need for the institution as a whole may request full pilot funding from either IT and/or DEC. It also may be requested that the DEC or IT project manage the pilot and product assessment process. After a pilot process, a product of interest will be taken to the IT Governance Committee for consideration for full implementation and funding.
Products selected for purchase and campus wide implementation will receive additional project management, support and training from a collaborative of IT and DEC staff. IT and/or the DEC will monitor maintenance and one on one support for technology users.
The DEC will also support the promotion of new campus wide technologies to faculty and student users.

Pilot requests will be reviewed and approved twice annually according to the following schedule:

• Requests submitted by September 15th will be reviewed and approved/denied by October 1st
• Requests submitted by February 15th will be reviewed and approved/denied by April 1st