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Strategy for UEA Web Provision 2010‐15 1

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Document Control Information

Title: Strategy for UEA Web Provision (2010‐2015) Date: 1st June 2010 Version: V0.5 Reference: Authors: Robin Keith/Jonathan Richardson Quality Assurance: Distribution

REVISION DATE REVISION DESCRIPTION v0.1 30/4/10 First draft, RK

V0.2 10/5/10 Second Draft, following comments from JR/JCF

V0.3 10/5/10 Following initial comments from Alan Preece/Suzy Gook

V0.4 17/5/10 Following comments from ISDMT

V0.5 1/6/10 Following comments from Web Steering Board

Backround paper for WEB Strategy 2010‐15 3

Introduction

The primary role of the University web presence is to manage our reputation as an institution globally. It is primarily the first and main point of contact for all key stakeholders, the main marketing tool for the University and the key tool to deliver the University brand.

The web is central to the delivery of academic and business process at UEA; this includes supporting teaching, research, communication, marketing and social use. Web services, perhaps more than other areas of ICT, have been (and continue to be) subject to rapid change with new technical developments and a significant cultural shift in the way that the Web is used and accessed.

In order to keep abreast of this rapid change the delivery mechanisms for Web Services have evolved resulting in the University running a mixed and diverse number of web systems. (see Background Document ‐ Appendix 2)

Mission The mission for Web Services is to provide appropriate, efficient, effective and intuitive Web Services in support of the Research, Education, Enterprise and Engagement objectives of the University as outlined in the Corporate Plan 2008‐12.

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Key Principles

• Value through information richness. • Ensure our web presence reflects the culture, ethos and expertise of the University and

differentiates us from other HE Institutions.

Marketing

• Appropriately manage the University’s reputation (e.g. assuring content and link quality).

• Ensure consistency of message in line with the University’s brand, while acknowledging diversity of audience.

• Ensure the quality, timeliness and accuracy of content on the University site. • Maximise our ratings in search engines, and encourage people to stay on the site • Ensure flexibility of design to enable rapid changes to our presentation. • Maximise the use of UEA’s unique selling points – cross linking and re‐using content. • Ensure content re‐use is built into site designs ‐ ensuring a single point of entry to

our resources. • Ensure cultural changes in user expectation are addressed rapidly. • Allow relationships to be built with users, through registration and personalisation

(avoiding over assuming customer desire).

Accessibility

• All UEA content must conform to national legislation and evolving international standards regarding accessibility.

• Ensure content is available via a range of interfaces to ensure choice for the user. • Ensure content is reviewed and delivered in a way which supports the equality and

diversity agenda. • Ensure content is easy to find – though clear navigation, independent of structure,

and broader and more relevant searching – review of information architecture.

Security

• Ensure all information available via the web is accessible to only the intended recipients in a secure and controlled manner, making clear distinction between public and private content.

• Ensure security best practice is adhered to and that we maintain a strong and robust method for authenticating users to our content.

• Provide mechanism s for authenticating users from partner institutions • Provide robust audit and compliance tools.

Extensible

• Use open standards to ensure the longevity of our systems. • Provide frameworks that can readily be accessed and extended by users to add their

own unique interfaces. • Ensure flexibility is built into our systems in order that emerging technologies can be

accommodated. • Provide a frame work for growth, using a Service Oriented Architecture.

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Value for money

• Fast follower NOT bleeding edge. • Improve efficiently of our systems and drive down the total cost of ownership • Provide central tools and resources to support the diverse requirements of the

University. • Derive the maximum value from our resources, data and content. • Provide appropriate support structures to enable efficient production of web

content.

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Vision

Our vision for UEA’s web presence is to present a seamless environment to both the outside world and internal users, giving the user choice over how and where they access our content. We envisage a suite of tools that will enable users to dynamically publish content to diverse destinations in a secure and controlled manner. By ensuring a rich and cohesive web presence we will ensure that the maximum value and visibility is obtained for our content in support of the marketing, research and educational objectives of the University.

In support of this vision we will prepare for the future now by:

• Delivering UEA's entire web presence via a single framework providing an open‐source portal container with content management, authentication, multiple delivery methods and local branding capability

• Developing and implementing all functionality as open portlets and web services to ensure component and data consistency and re‐use.

• Providing the framework for UEA's web presence, and empowering and enabling the wider community to make best use of the framework to ensure UEA has a cohesive web presence.

AuthenticationopenAthens +

Shibboleth, + openSSO bridge

AP=Vintela/AD

VLE

eVision

Library Systems

PMA

Middleware

Application Specific

implem

entations

Standardised Service Interfaces

Authentication

CMS + Portal Home page

School & departmental pages

The Portal Alumni

Research groups, projects Research spe

cific

3rd p

arty

UEA

develop

ed

PersonalisationAuthentication

Research project specific

functionality

Portlets Cloud hosted copies of web presence

FacebookiGoogle

Mobile devicesiPhone, smart phones

etc

Web browsers

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Background paper for Strategy for UEA Web Provision 2010‐15 7

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Document Control Information

Title: Backround paper for Strategy for UEA Web Provision (2010‐2015) Date: 30th April 2010 Version: V0.3 Reference: Authors: Robin Keith Quality Assurance: Distribution

REVISION DATE REVISION DESCRIPTION v0.1 30/4/10 First draft, RK

V0.2 10/5/10 Second Draft, following comments from JR/JCF

V0.3 10/5/10 Following initial comments from Alan Preece/Suzy Gook

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Introduction

This paper outlines the background information and consultation that has led to the proposed Strategy for Web Provision.

The University is a diverse environment, and the website – and wider ‘web presence’ – reflects that. A Web Strategy ensures these diverse elements are focused into a cohesive whole1 that appears co‐ordinated to the outside world and internal customers. This is particularly relevant for search engines, which rank page results based on an organisation’s overall prominence.

A Web Strategy ensures that online activities support the core activities of the University in teaching, learning and research, complementing and enhancing the wider marketing and engagement effort. The internet evolves even more rapidly than other technologies. It’s tempting to engage with every new advancement, but by doing so we risk loosing sight of our overall objectives. A web strategy helps keep focus, and provides a framework for making well‐considered, evidence‐based, decisions that offer best value.

In the last five years we have made considerable steps towards a cohesive web presence, with the introduction of a content management system (CMS) and institutional Portal (Blackboard), largely standardising branding, and automated feeds of information from internal systems. It’s important to remember that the website is in many ways the tip of an iceberg, and hides a substantial administration effort below. A strong Web Strategy ensures that business processes surrounding information destined for the web are considered in a wider context, to offer good value across the organisation.

UEA is broadly in line with other institutions (SIRC, 2009) in terms of structure (central function, editing devolved to departments, requiring high flexibility), work (high workload, challenges achieving quality) and positioning (‘the rather choppy waters where new digital media, ‘old school University culture’ … business and marketing meet’).

What's changed in the last 5 years?

• All HE's have established web sites, content is often similar, makes it difficult to differentiate in search engine results.

• Social media has changed expectations for delivery of services. Upcoming prospective students have high dependency (not just familiarity) on search engines.

• HE market become more competitive, domestic student numbers capped, international students becoming more important, as is good rankings.

• Open source products (where generally the software is free and support is paid for) have become much more sophisticated. Large vendors like Sun/Oracle have invested heavily, making for very sophisticated offerings, with support options expected of proprietary software.

• Use of mobile technologies has become increasingly sophisticated ‐ iPhones, etc enabling more sophisticated interactions with services.

• Authentication has moved significantly ‐ OpenId allows users to link existing accounts to application user accounts. OpenSSO standardises single sign‐on, SAML standardises

1 Walter and Scott (2006) identify ‘Holistic thinking of company activities’ as the most important web related strategic issue.

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authentication providers. OpenAthens provides federated authentication for services, and bridges between various providers

• Dominance of Google as a search engine and Facebook for social networking • Considerable inroads in pushing content to managed systems, consolidating web servers and

improving UEA's web infrastructure ‐ but more still to do.

Current Status

In evaluating issues and identifying the requirements for Web Services to support the activities of the University we have undertaken a range of reviews, stake holder meetings and focus groups as well as drawing together information from other sources. In summarising the current state and building the rational we have focused on core areas where usage is typically more diverse. These are:

• Marketing • Research • Teaching And Learning • Enterprise and Engagement • Students • Business Process • Web Publishing

The Marketing Context

The University’s web pages must appeal to a number of different target audiences including: • Potential undergraduate, postgraduate taught and research students

(international/home/EU)

• Businesses

• Policy makers and funders

• Alumni and key donors

• Teachers, advisors, educational agents and parents

• Potential academic partners

• Staff

Each group has differing needs, wants and preferences for ways in which it wishes to engage with the University through new technologies. The web needs to offer a clearly navigable route to key information and content which will stimulate, excite and communicate our key messages. As we are currently experiencing a demographic peak in the number of 18 year olds applying to university, we need to be aware that the buoyant application numbers in 2010 will reduce, and the need to build strong reputations for teaching and research, especially throughout Europe and overseas is increasingly important, and the web site is often the first contact that many of our customers and stakeholders have with the University. The role of parents and academic advisers in the university decision making process is even stronger than ever and ongoing market research is key to ensuring the web site is appealing across the board.

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There is a need for the University to distinguish itself against a number of strong competitors and we need to focus on areas where we can genuinely claim leadership or a unique advantage such as our campus and location, the student experience and our research strengths. This needs to be communicated clearly and consistently throughout our web site. A web presence which allows diversity but still retains central indexing and branding control will enhance our ranking both in search engines and with our users.

The Research Context

Web support for UEA’s Research groups (including projects and conferences) is piecemeal and on demand, often not involving ITCS at all. Some groups use the Polopoly web CMS, others develop their own site, often re‐inventing CMS functionality in the process, and publish through the cPanel hosting service. Web support could be much improved, which could lead to enhanced and more efficient working processes within the Research Groups, as well as helping them to create better links with the outside world. That improved promotion leads to the greater chance of additional research funding for the Groups, as well as improving the reputation of UEA as a whole. The ISD Review of research website support (April 2010) proposes a framework, or ‘package’ of functionality, which could be provided for any research project/group or conference. Each individual project could brand the site as required, and add any specific functionality via ‘plug‐ins’. Providing common functionality within a managed environment will allow researchers access to richer web presences more quickly and cost effectively overall, while allowing the web team to offer higher quality support. Delivering services through a managed environment allows for more control, increased assurance on security, while retaining and encouraging diversity, reducing exposure (for example increased security). High quality research sites (if well linked to/from the main UEA website) will help to boost all UEA pages in search engine rankings, so have a positive impact on recruitment etc. effectively, using our research presence as a marketing tool. See Appendix 1 for an overview of how pages could interrelate.

The Teaching and Learning Context

Since its introduction usage of the VLE has been patchy at best. In some areas it is heavily used and in others hardly at all

The VLE is currently heavily integrated with the Portal‐ both using the same software and infrastructure. By separating the VLE from the wider web presence we can leverage its usage more dynamically . This will also assist us in improving the pace of development of the vLE, which has been hindered by its proprietary and monolithic nature.

From a learning perspective we do not take full advantage of the research output of the university – We should enhance our internal systems to enable students to get better access to existing expertise in the university

The Enterprise an Engagement Context

NetCommunities has significant functional overlap with a portal container/content management system – the most significant difference being the set of users served.

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A long term aim would be to assimilate NetCommunities provisioned services into the main portal/CMS, creating a data feeds of users from Raiser's Edge (and potentially alternative CRM systems), and data feeds of activity back to RaisersEdge. This also allows for ALL website activity ‐ from new applicants, researchers, businesses ‐ to be analysed in RaisersEdge. Pushing all CRM contacts through the same system could have enormous benefits, and is in line with the marketing corporate policy of presenting a single unified face to the world. There may be some cost saving in annual support for NetCommunities and benefits from focusing staff activity into a single product.

The Student Context

Students come to the university having experienced a range of systems for accessing web content. The expectations of these students are changing all the time. The University has been unable to respond in a rapid enough manner in the past. Historically we have required students to access a range of disparate systems to access course, timetable or social information.

We should be providing systems that enable a student to access information from home, on the bus, or when out and about.

Students are often unaware of the range of skills and research that are available within the University – by integrating our systems we will be able to provide better information on research related to the modules they are undertaking for example, or the key interests of lecturers.

The Business Process and Web Publishing Context

Polopoly ‐ Although inexpensive in terms of annual support, Polopoly does not deliver good value for money because:

• Usability is poor, placing a considerable burden on admin staff and schools maintaining content, without providing flexibility (such as micro sites).

• Development is expensive and slow, meaning we cannot be responsive to changing business needs.

• The underlying technology is flawed (such as indexing via a text file based open source solution, rather than database; antonymous mode adds huge complexity without delivering robustness). Generally, UEA's team know more about our implementation that the supplier.

• Inability to take advantage of industry standard technology, or developments from other institutions

• Inability to track customer interactions; significant development and retraining effort to move to next version.

The Portal Context

The current portal uses Blackboard and is expensive to run in terms of hardware, vendor support costs and UEA staff costs. Expanding the current system to deliver services via mobile devices will incur an additional expense. Moving to the next version will also require a significant retraining and development effort.

There are alternatives, the leading contenders being open source solutions (Moodle or Saki).

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The existing portal functionality can be considered separately to the VLE since it uses the Blackboard Community System, not the Teaching System. The portal does not currently offer good value for money ‐ functionality exposed through the portal could be delivered with a much less sophisticated product; Blackboard is not standards based, so we cannot take advantage of standard portlets; we are limited to delivering content only through a website (rather than optionally delivering services through mobile or widgets).

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Consultative Arrangements

Internal reviews and reports referenced include

Beckett, P. (ISD), April 2010. Student ICT provision ‐ Focus group report.

Helgeson, J. (ISD), February 2010. Enhancing Library Management systems, JISC Bid.

ISD Management Team, 2008. ISD Strategy 2008‐13.

Keith, R., ISD, January 2010. Report on Polopoly Stability Issues.

Koro, E., ISD, November 2008. ISD Portal/eVision focus group.

Magic Online Solutions, August 2009. UEA Search Proposal.

Mudock, H. (Equality Officer, HR), December 2008. UEA website redesign, Accessibility Questionnaire.

Ogden, A., Head of Communications, UEA, August 2009 (updated November 2009). UEA Internal Communications Proposal.

Preece, A., Director Marketing and Communications, UEA, 2008. UEA Corporate Communications Strategy.

UEA Executive Team, 2008. UEA Corporate Plan 2008 ‐ 2012.

External Research Referenced

Arcaida Project Blog, 2009. Do libraries cater for today’s undergraduate students? Website: http://arcadiaproject.blogspot.com/2009/11

Coombs, K., Drupal Done Right, 2009. Library Journal, 134 (19), pp.30‐32.

Drupal in Education, online group ‐ http://groups.drupal.org/drupal‐education

Drupal‐based education sites, webpage http://groups.drupal.org/node/11258#highered

Bronson, R. (Ed), 2008‐2010. EduStir blog (‘A blog about high education, web strategy and the spaces in between’) Various articles. http://blog.edustir.com/

Fake, M., Green, T., July 2009. JISCRI Library Social Widgets Toolkit ‐ JISC Project by LSE.

JISC. Blue sky thinking or head in the clouds?, Autumn 2009. JISC Inform, issue 26.

Law, D., University of Strathclyde. Headlights on Dark Roads, July 2009. Presentation at Institutional Web Management Workshop 2009. http://iwmw.ukoln.ac.uk/iwmw2009/talks/law/

SIRC for Eduserv, July 2009. Investigation into the management of web content in Higher Education Institutions.

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Mulholland, A.. Mashup Corporations, 2006. Evolved Technologist Press.

Oh‐Young, C. & Archambault, L. Experiences With Integrating Drupal Into Higher Education, 2009. In G. Siemens & C. Fulford (Eds.), Proceedings of World Conference on Educational Multimedia, Hypermedia and Telecommunications 2009 (p. 433). Chesapeake, VA: AACE.

Smethurst, M. (BBC). How the BBC Make Web sites, July 2009. Presentation at Institutional Web Management Workshop 2009. http://www.slideshare.net/iwmw/how‐the‐bbc‐make‐web‐sites

White, D., June 2007. Results of Web 2.0 services survey undertaken by SPIRE project ‐ JISC Project by University of Oxford.

Will, E.A., Callison, C., June 2006. Web presence of universities: Is higher education sending the right message online? Public Relations Review, 32 (2), pp.180‐183.

Yousif, H., March 2009. SPLASH (personalised learning experience through web 2.0 technologies): Final Report ‐ JISC Project by University of Sussex.

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Appendix 1: Linkage between Pages

Diagram showing potential links between pages, using research based sites to reinforce the main UEA web presence. Red boxes show landing pages (where search engine traffic will be targeted towards). Dotted lines show optional linkages. Aim would be to generated lists of projects etc automatically.

Home Page

List of faculties

Course Page

List of Modules

School Home Page

Faculty Home Page

List of Schools

Research Centre Home Page

Research Group Home Page

Conference Home Page

List of Speakers

Person Page

Press Release

Expert Search

Country-specific

Info Page

Sponsorhip/Prize List

Event

Open Day,Public

Lecture,Festival

List of Staff associated

with Research

centre/group

ModulePage

List Person’s Research Projects

Publication List

Contrib. authors

Job Oppertunity

Research Centres

List(group by faculty)

Associated Research Centres

List

List Associated Research Groups

School Staff List

(A-Z)

List Person’s Research Groups

Members

Research Project Home Page

List Associated Research Projects

List Courses + Modules taught or

lead

Course Finder

Matched Courses

CourseLeader

Module Tutor(s)

Publication Digital Object

(Internal or external)

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Appendix 2 – Current UEA Web Provision

The web is widely used at UEA for a variety of purposes which includes supporting teaching and research, communication, marketing, resource access requirements and social use. The key web services and interfaces are:

• Polopoly ‐ provides the home page, majority of faculty and school pages, recruitment pages, and the majority of pages of internal and external content.

• Blackboard ‐ provides the portal for current staff/students, the Virtual Learning Environment (VLE) and ‘organisations’ – Blackboard access is limited to groups of UEA users, functionality includes wikis, forums, blogs etc.

• Netcommunities ‐ alumni content, provides Customer Relationship Management (CRM) functionality for non‐UEA users such as Alumni.

• Static html ‐ mainly legacy internal pages are plain html, severed through a web server • Dedicated corporate web applications including:

o eVision: Student information and timetabling portal for current students Admissions enquiry requests Online applications to PG courses.

o Library systems Aleph – library catalogue MetaLib – online electronic resource access Broadsearch – aggregated library, digital repository and resource search

o Research admin systems. • cPanel hosted sites ‐ 40+ sites, mostly research groups / projects, and affiliated

organisations, including: o Tyndall o SCVA o PGOracle o UEA Volunteers o Graduate Student Association o Various conference websites

• Windows hosted websites including: o Sportspark

• Various web servers in schools: o http://biobis.bio.uea.ac.uk/biosql/people_atoz.aspx o http://fizz.cmp.uea.ac.uk

• External services: o Facebook ‐ used mainly for recruitment. o UCAS ‐ domestic undergraduate courses advertised, and applications processed,

through central service. o Various outsourced functions ‐ e.g. newsletter sending service.

• Personal web pages for Students and Staff o Maintained through insecure loginX machines o No control over content, branding, accessibility etc – but uses www.uea.ac.uk

domain. Difficult to distance from the institution in case of problems, and will be considered as part the corporate site by site engines – which could include off‐message content.

o Deliberately not monitored (to strengthen the legal defence that UEA provides hosting only). The potential for reputation damage is high.

o Variety of uses from ‘online CV’ to pictures of pets.

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Figure 1: Block diagram of UEA's current web presence

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