Access for Success

The campus of SUNY Potsdam is no exception. In fact, the College is now more wired than ever.

Recently, the College completed a major upgrade of its on-campus network, reaching into every room and building on campus. That means anyone with a computer has immediate access to a high-speed Internet connection.

“We’re light years ahead of where we were just three years ago,” said Andy Harradine ’88, assistant vice president for Information Technology. “We have stateof- the-art networking capabilities across campus. Every building is wired with fiber optics.”

Potsdam also benefits from being one of just 200 universities connected to Internet2 — an advanced networking consortium of higher education, research companies and government agencies. The goal is to develop a high-performance infrastructure that will enhance various academic and research missions.

“If you’re watching a video or listening to audio over the Internet, it’s often choppy and will even cut off entirely,” Harradine said. “With Internet2, that stream is as clear as ever.”

AVAILABLE ONLINE

While there are downsides and distractions for everyone with a computer and an Internet connection, the positive impact that technology has had on higher education is indisputable.

Let’s just say it goes way beyond putting the card catalogue online.

Social Networks Owning a laptop computer and cellular phone doesn’t necessarily make Felicia Neahr feel like the most wired (or wireless) student on the campus of SUNY Potsdam. “I don’t have a wireless card for my computer. And I didn’t even know what an iPod was when I was a freshman,” said Neahr, an English and communications major from New York’s Saratoga Springs region currently in her senior year at Potsdam. Having a computer at college is not a luxury, it’s a necessity, according to Neahr. Potsdam’s Computing and Technology Services estimates more than 85 percent of the College’s students have their own computer. Yes, they do use their computers constructively: E-mail is used to stay in contact with professors, classmates, family and friends; students use the Internet to conduct research, check course schedules, grades and their student accounts; and they visit news sites, to keep up with current events. Students do, however, use their computers for, let’s say, less constructive means, like instant messaging (or IM), shopping and, more than ever, browsing others and keeping up their own profile on Facebook and MySpace.com. The two Internet sites undoubtedly have redefined the nature of social networking especially among teenagers and young adults. Even students realize this. “People who may be less outgoing are more comfortable posting their profiles online,” Neahr said. “There’s comfort in knowing that the screen is always between you and whoever is looking at your profile.” This summer, MySpace, overtook Yahoo! and Google as the most visited U.S. site on the Internet. Within just two years, Facebook went from a Web site hosted in the dorm room of a Harvard college student to being hosted in Silicon Valley, Calif., drawing 8 million college students a day. While advertisers drool at the possibilities of luring that coveted but elusive 18-35-year-old marketing demographic, many are growing increasingly concerned about the time college students spend networking online rather than networking in person. The ramifications of posting highly personal information about oneself (including residence hall and dorm room number) or pictures from last weekend’s kegger are still undetermined. Colleges are spending more time monitoring what their student body is doing outside of class, and Potsdam is no exception. William “Chip” Morris ’78, director of SUNY Potsdam’s Office of Student Conduct and Community Standards, says “I am staggered at the lack of common sense. There’s pictures of frat parties with underage drinking and people behaving inappropriately. There’s a complete lack of accountability associated with these sites.” While the College has taken action on some students for posting threats toward others and has spoken to athletic teams, fraternities and sororities, there’s little it can do about many situations. “It’s very hard to prove from a judicial point of view,” Morris said, “that there was actually alcohol in the glass pictured on one of the sites.” Like it or not, Morris says Internet sites like Facebook, MySpace and similar social networking sites are here to stay. But online social networking, he said, cannot take the place of personal interaction. According to Morris, “ultimately one’s success is determined on how you interact in person with others.” The reality for Neahr and her classmates, however, is that a big part of student life is just a click away.

Much of that activity takes place right on Potsdam’s Web site. Course schedules, classrooms and grades are posted online. Professors and faculty support staff now stay connected to their students through e-mail and instant messaging. Professors can take advantage of several “smart” classrooms, many of which are equipped with high-speed and/or wireless networking, high-definition projectors, Smart Boards, VCRs, DVD players and computers. Rooms are used to teach in areas such as art, music, education, technology, science and of course computer science.

The technology on campus is at a stage where a professor can teach a class at Potsdam, stream it over the Web and have it piped into any room in the world with an Internet connection.

College administrators realize that, more than ever, the Web site has become the single most important contact point for the College. It’s often the first impression of the College most future students get.

The Office of Admissions relies heavily on the Web site as a recruiting tool, replacing or enhancing many traditional recruiting techniques.

“We still send out publications and hold college fairs, but it’s not the number one place future college students get their information about a school anymore,” said Melissa Evans, assistant director of admissions at SUNY Potsdam. “Students — and their parents — are already online and researching college Web sites.”

Potsdam admissions officers are staying in touch with students more closely than ever. Last spring, staff members were assigned an instant messaging, or IM, account. “Our business cards even have our IM account on them now,” Evans said. “It’s great to have that direct contact. It seems like there’s more work on the front end; there’s definitely a lot of multi-tasking involved. But overall, it saves more time on the backend: it takes less time to process applications, and we save time and money on mailings. Since we have rolling admissions, we can give a student a decision in 24 to 48 hours.”

POTSDAM.EDU

Even as important as the Web site is for recruitment, it’s also critical to the daily functioning of the College: Eighty-five percent of the traffic on the Potsdam.edu Web site comes from current students and faculty, said Mindy Collins, Potsdam’s electronic communications coordinator and Web site developer.

“Students and faculty use the site to check their e-mail, post and read course descriptions, register for courses online and pay for services as well as stay informed about all events on campus. Alumni can use the site for giving to the college over a secured server,” Collins said. “There are actually more tools for those already here than for promoting the campus in general.”

The reality of the Internet, however, is that any Web site is short lived. Like any corporation or nonprofit organization, Potsdam’s challenge is to update and redesign its site regularly. “A Web site has a lifespan of about two years,” Collins said. “It’s a challenge to keep up with all the information while keeping the site new and fresh. The goal for us is to get information out there and make it easy to find without making the site too flashy.” Many students who attend Potsdam come from rural regions of northern New York, where high-speed Internet remains elusive or too costly. A Web site that is too “flashy” could take several minutes to download if a viewer is using a dial-up modem. Collins said discussions on a redesign of SUNY Potsdam’s Web site have already begun, however, it could take several months to complete.

TECHNOLOGY: A MOVING TARGET

While much has been done already, the College still faces challenges in keeping up with technology. State funding, for one, has remained flat for 20 years, according to Harradine. And while some computing costs have gone down, the College spends more in other areas. “Fifteen years ago, the College spent $75,000 on a computer with 100 gigabytes of storage,” he said. “Today, you can buy that much storage for less than $100. But now, we’re spending more money on PCs. We have to replace every computer on campus every three years.”

Harradine said one of his biggest challenges is staffing. Three people in his office take care of more than 1,400 computers.

Every semester, the college collects a technology fee of $137 from each student per semester — or nearly $600,000. Harradine is adamant that money from the fee is spent only on equipment that students can use and from which they will benefit.

Today’s faculty and college students have the ability to work more efficiently than ever. Potsdam is not only keeping pace with others technologically, it’s outrunning many of its counterparts. The challenge is to always stay ahead of the curve.