Strategic Impacts

The University at Buffalo is a large and complicated organization where faculty and staff often have difficulty navigating the policies and processes surrounding the use of technology in their programs and courses. The gateway gathers into one location tools to help faculty and staff: 

• support the use of technology in teaching and make requests for procuring and deploying new technologies within university policies and processes under the appropriate oversight;
  
• work with campus organizations, service managers, and department website managers to provide appropriate communications and referral statements so faculty and staff can easily and efficiently find their way to technology through existing services;
• work to promote compliance with existing procurement and implementation processes and policies; and 
• interact with campus offices that support instructional effectiveness and institutional success.

Identifying a technology that will meet faculty instructional needs and understanding at what level that technology is implemented can be difficult. Many times a course or program employs specific teaching activities and methodologies but faculty are unsure of whether there is a best practice or technology that can meet those instructional goals. This gateway will provide a tool for learning what technologies are available at UB, connect instructional needs to training resources, provide a pathway to program and course design consultation, and best practices for use of existing teaching technologies.

This gateway provides a transparent view of the UB procurement process with the goal of helping faculty and staff to simply and efficiently work through the steps of assessment, procurement, and Implementation of a teaching technology by: 

• visualizeing the scope of the required process; 
• reminding applicants of the issues and risks related to implementing new technologies; 
• outlining the policies and processes required for the procurement or implementation of a teaching technology: 
  • student fee process;
  • procurement process;
    
  • digital and web accessibility policy and parameters;
  • network and data security policy and parameters;
  • leagal review process; and;
• informing technology stakeholders so they can:
  • actively participate in the process; 
  • provide the support where required; and 
  • provide oversight as needed;
• provide listing of certified outcomes for support services so technology is not implemented without meeting required policy and process guidelines.

Vendor marketing practices can be difficult to navigate. This gateway provides a vendor registration process that will collect technology details including: 

• vendor corporate details and contacts; technology name and description; teaching methodologies targeted by the technology; 
• Learning Technology Integration (LTI) requirements; 
• Voluntary Product Accessibility Template (VPAT)/Accessibility Conformance Report; and 
• pricing models and associated user fees.

The vendor registration process will allow faculty and staff a central location to refer vendor inquiries to and help to reduce the impact of sales calls and marketing on productive work.