Category Archives: 2019 Conference

Communication Award Winner – Golf Cart Pedagogy

As instructional technologists and IT professionals, we often look for unique ways to capture our communities’ attention, competing with their ever-overloaded inboxes. We never expected that this oddball idea born from a lack of sleep and a lengthy car ride could take us from the narrow campus walkways to the bright lights of New Orleans, LA. Golf Cart Pedagogy, our higher-ed take on the popular hit Car Pool Karaoke, engages our College community.

Golf Cart on Campus

The core idea isn’t anything new: record and share interviews. We needed something different. At the time, it seemed like the strangest, silliest thing imaginable: take guests about campus on a humble, often-seen golf cart; drive around at super-slow, laughable speed; and converse about pedagogy, technology, and often humanity. Since its launch in April 2019, the ride-along has become an episodic campus cult classic, inviting guests from all walks of college life to share their experiences in higher education.

As we continued to see its popularity grow on campus, we were looking for a way to share the idea on a grander scale. On the encouragement of a colleague, we entered the first episode of Golf Cart Pedagogy for a SIGUCCS Communication Award. Honestly, the thought of others seeing our work from around the country was very exciting, yet scary. With a deep breath and a high-five, we decided to submit our work to SIGUCCS for consideration.

Then word came: we won a communications award for long format video. Imbued with the newfound pride and acceptance of our oddity, we really leaned full tilt into the silliness. And a little secret for those of you that know, one of the perks to winning this award is that you are given a poster session slot at the annual meeting to promote your work. Insert maniacal laugh… Our plan work for worldwide media domination began.

Golf Cart on Campus

As with most things we do, we find the most non-traditional way of going about it and commit fully. We turned our poster into the inside of a golf cart, and our session into a chance to interview our extended community of IT professionals. We even turned our session into an episode!

Reflecting back on our experience with SIGUCCS, we are left with fond memories, new friendships, and a wider view of higher ed. The real strength of a conference like the SIGUCCS annual conference is in the conversations and connections with a welcoming community of fellow professionals. We’re all able to come together, let our hair down (figuratively for some of us), and really dive deep into our institutional successes and opportunities. Furthermore, being an award winner allowed us to show off our inner rockstars for at least a few hours. This award now hangs with pride in our office and serves as a reminder that creativity and silliness do have a place in IT.

Anthony Dalton and Thomas Sciarrino
Muhlenberg College

SIGUCCS 2019 Conference Takeaway – Campus Experience for Online Classes

Bringing Campus Experience to Online Classes

Key problems in making the online experience “equivalent” to campus experience were the ability to have real time meetings, a good recording/streaming platform, and how to handle labs and specialty software. University of Oregon discussed the solutions that they implemented to support these three issues and how the platforms that they implemented provided a solution that satisfied their students and faculty.

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SIGUCCS 2019 Conference Takeaway – Accessibility

An A11yance: Approaches for Transferring Expertise to Build Accessibility Liaisons in the Campus Community

Rutgers University and Princeton University presented on their individual approaches to building accessibility awareness and expertise across their campuses.

Princeton University has a program in place to allow members of the university to get CPACC certified. These people become local experts to assist with accessibility questions within their departments. As part of this certification, they have a study group for people working on the certification class together. This includes quizzes and lunch and learn sessions.

Rutgers University uses a series of in-house training classes to educate staff within departments to become their accessibility liaisons. Additional resources are available through online offerings.

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SIGUCCS 2019 Conference Takeaway – Applying Design Thinking

Applying Design Thinking: Panel

How familiar are you with Design Thinking? Were you aware of the 5 steps (Empathize, Define, Ideate, Prototype, and Test)? Did you know you could apply design thinking to IT support? The team from Texas Woman’s University provided an overview of how they used problem solving and empathy to get to the heart of what their customers were needing.

Texas Woman's University Team
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SIGUCCS 2019 Conference Takeaway – Catch the Big Bad Wolf

Catch the Big Bad Wolf: A Cybersecurity-themed Escape Room

Ok, this was not a presentation, but an experience. Attendance was limited due to a limited number of escape room kits. After a short introduction, attendees had to solve a puzzle while learning about cybersecurity.

The good news is that this escape room kit is available for use by anyone. It was originally created by Grinnell College and University of Nebraska. Indiana University customized it to meet their needs and be focused on their educational materials.

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SIGUCCS 2019 Conference Committee Introductions – Mo Nishiyama

This article is part of a series introducing the SIGUCS 2019 Conference Conference Committee. Each Committee member submitted answers to questions created by the SIGUCCS Marketing Committee.

Mo Nishiyama

What is your volunteer position for 2019 and how would you explain it to someone new to SIGUCCS?
Webmaster. Keep our community informed and apprised year-round about the conference-related events.

How many SIGUCCS conferences have you attended?
13

How did you get involved as a volunteer in SIGUCCS?
I was voluntold (it was a good thing).

What’s an accomplishment that you are especially proud of?
I was indicted into the ACM SIGUCCS Hall of Fame in 2018.

What do you do for fun?
Cook, bicycle, read, taste wines, and attend conferences

SIGUCCS 2019 New Orleans … what is your favorite french food?
Brie de Meaux

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SIGUCCS 2019 Conference Committee Introductions – Eric Handler

This article is part of a series introducing the SIGUCS 2019 Conference Conference Committee. Each Committee member submitted answers to questions created by the SIGUCCS Marketing Committee.

What is your volunteer position for 2019 and how would you explain it to someone new to SIGUCCS?
This year I’m serving as the Poster Session coordinator. The poster coordinator helps read the papers associated with poster presentation and also makes sure everyone has the supplies they need and the space they need in order to make our poster session awesome. Except for the snacks, our awesome conference planners help with that! Intellectual content is the focus of my position!

How many SIGUCCS conferences have you attended?
4

How did you get involved as a volunteer in SIGUCCS?
At my first SIGUCCS, I spent a lot of time in the hospitality suite and got to talking a lot about my love of board games. As I made suggestions throughout the conference to various folks around the room word of my interest spread and some time later I was approached to ask if I would volunteer to coordinate the suite the next year. Or at least, that’s how I remember it.

What’s an accomplishment that you are especially proud of
If you’d like to hear about a personal accomplishment I’m proud of, please come to my lightning talk in New Orleans this year. Saying more would be a spoiler. Professionally, I’m proud to be a member of a team of academic technologists that are beloved by the faculty that we support. As challenging as it can be to schedule work around visits from faculty to my office, the fact that they seek me and my teammates out around the campus when they need assistance is great. It takes a lot of work to maintain that kind of trust across the faculty.

SIGUCCS 2019 New Orleans … what is your favorite french food?
Garlic Confit, because spreadable garlic is great, but if I need to pick a whole meal, Moules Marinières

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SIGUCCS 2019 Conference Committee Introductions – Cate Lyon

This article is part of a series introducing the SIGUCS 2019 Conference Conference Committee. Each Committee member submitted answers to questions created by the SIGUCCS Marketing Committee.

Cate Lyon

What is your volunteer position for 2019 and how would you explain it to someone new to SIGUCCS?
Newcomer/First Timers Coordinator – If you are new to SIGUCCS, I will be there to welcome you, answer any questions you might have and help you navigate the conference.

How many SIGUCCS conferences have you attended?
Memphis was my first – so … 7?

How did you get involved as a volunteer in SIGUCCS?
I introduced a couple CIO’s in a presentation – they didn’t give me any information so I made up their backstories (I believe one became a circus performer dropout and another who wanted to be the first female placekicker in the NFL?) – Melissa was in the session and it was all over from there.

chicken

Something that you could always stop and talk to me about …
Pugs and Chickens

SIGUCCS 2019 New Orleans … what is your favorite french food?
Beignets

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SIGUCCS 2019 Conference Committee Introductions – Cristina Koorie

This article is part of a series introducing the SIGUCS 2019 Conference Conference Committee. Each Committee member submitted answers to questions created by the SIGUCCS Marketing Committee.

What is your volunteer position for 2019 and how would you explain it to someone new to SIGUCCS?
I am the Social Media Coordinator. I am responsible for managing the conference’s presence on social media. Currently, that is primarily Facebook and Twitter.

How many SIGUCCS conferences have you attended?
3

How did you get involved as a volunteer in SIGUCCS?
Mentioned to a few SIGUCCS members I was interested in volunteering and someone reached out about an open position on the committee.

Something that you could always stop and talk to me about …
Food!

SIGUCCS 2019 New Orleans … what is your favorite french food?
Croque Madame

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