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Education

Unit Resources Including Technology

CSC Technology Mission and Vision

Chadron State College seeks to provide its communities (students, faculty and staff, community members and alumni) a technology-rich environment, balanced by human needs and educational excellence.

Consistent with this vision, Chadron State College supports the use of appropriate technology to enhance educational goals, community outreach, and administrative activities. Chadron State College is committed to integrating technologies in the traditional campus and extended campus segments of its population where it is appropriate and beneficial.

The CSC Technology Plan for Chadron State College was developed by committee in August of 2000. The committee developed the vision with regard to the function and focus of technology, as well as the mission statement describing the technology environment. Appendix IV of the plan details the precepts upon which the Operational Plan and General Principles are based.

The Department of Information Technology Unit operates a state-of-the-art enterprise server providing all CSC candidates with a full suite of computer languages and statistical packages. All 647 resident hall suites/rooms are hard-wired for direct connectivity to the campus network infrastructure (Campus Pipeline). Through Campus Pipeline candidates have access to their personal registration, grade reports, financial aid information, the Internet, and more. More than 26 department and general use computer labs, open to all candidates, are strategically located throughout campus. For candidate convenience, the flagship lab facility is located in the College's centralized residence facility, on the ground floor of the Highrise, and is open extended hours. Email and Internet access are provided to every candidate upon registration at CSC.

Table 6.8 provides a listing of computer labs on the CSC campus.

Supported application software includes word processing, spreadsheet, database, presentation, e-mail client, web browser, statistics, anti-virus, anti-spyware, and media players. Both Windows and MacIntosh operating systems are supported.

The Department of Information Technology provides consultation, production and other services to support the use of technology, instruction and research. Faculty are provided assistance in creating original teaching materials compatible with on-line instructional formats (Blackboard), distance education program planning and assistance, as well at training in ways to better "instruct" using the campus Interactive Distance Learning (ITV) technologies. These services are provided by technicians in CSC's regional programs unit, and from CSC's Instructional Technology Coordinator.

With regard to library support, acquisition of books, periodicals and other resources has risen from $36,116.00 in 1997-98, to $40,040 in 2004-05, a 9% increase over the last five years (not adjusted for inflation). These funds are a separate budget and not a part of the School's general operations funding. Additionally, students are provided with 24 hours Internet access, as well as on-line access to other library resources within the state of Nebraska

The Reta E. King Library, a 45,500 square foot facility, is available for use by students, faculty and staff of the college and by community members who have a need for the materials housed there. The facility is open seven days a week during the Fall and Spring semesters. Shorter hours are kept during college vacation periods and when classes are not in session. Scheduled operating hours and a listing of available library resources may be found on their website at http://library.nscs.edu/screens/libinfo.html. The library staff consists of trained, degreed professional librarians, clerical assistants, and student assistants. Professional staff are available during all hours that the library is open.

The library's catalog may be found on the Online Public Access Catalog (OPAC). It is an electronic catalog, consisting of the combined resources of the Nebraska State College System, which includes Chadron State College, Peru State College, and Wayne State College. Searches may be limited to the King Library collections. However the materials of the other two libraries are also available for direct online loan to CSC students, faculty and staff with currently valid I.D. cards. The library collection stands at 220,000 items.

On the lower level are the juvenile collection and the curriculum collection for education students. The upper level of the library houses the bulk of the non-fiction collection, arranged by Dewey Decimal number.

The Department of Information Technology Hardware and Software Description 

Hardware available for use by students, faculty and degree candidates includes computers placed in residence halls, mediated and distance learning classrooms, computer labs, offices and server rooms. Approximately 39 classrooms are provided with computer equipment. More than 26 departmental and general access computer labs are provided for student use.

As indicated above, technology resources are provided in every campus building for student and faculty use. Each instructor's office is equipped with a computer, appropriate software, internet services, printing, and data storage devices. Computer labs are updated annually and conventional classrooms are being converted to mediated classrooms, which are equipped with digital projectors, screens. 

Infrastructure Description

Access to the Internet is provided by four T1 lines, which are connected to the State of Nebraska fiber backbone at Grand Island. Two T1 lines are dedicated to six residence halls. Two other T1 lines provide Internet access for all other buildings.

The Gigabit backbone is distributed among 24 locations across campus and fiber-optic lines transport data as well as video. Multimode fiber is also distributed throughout campus, but is not in use. The fiber aggregation point is Miller Hall, which is the main distribution facility. Desktop connectivity is provided by Category 5 cable.

A Cisco router provides Internet connectivity via the four T1 lines and another router provides dialup lines for emergency connectivity for The Department of Information Technology personnel. A packet shaper manages student-housing traffic. The Gigabit backbone speed is connected to each of the 24 locations across campus.

Installation of wireless connects in the King Library and the Student Center was recently completed during the summer of 2005. Further installation of wireless will continue across campus in a systematic and controlled fashion. 

LAN Description 

The network for administrative and academic functions consists of 23 servers, 72 staff workstations, and 269 lab workstations. In addition, hundreds of stand-alone Windows and Macintosh workstations are connected to the network. Approximately 700 student-housing residents are connected to the campus network.

CSC employs seven individuals whose offices are located off-campus at Nebraska community college campuses. A CSC Windows PC lab is also located on one community college campus. Network connections for these individuals and the lab are provided by the community colleges.

Information technology is generally adequate for faculty and candidates. Recently, the campus firewall was upgraded and new network wiring installed. In order to improve the long-term data availability for faculty, the Office of Institutional Research has received approval to advertise for an in-house programmer to develop data management browser-interface software, through which we can track student academic performance and display the data graphically in various disaggregated formats. In the interim, unit faculty will continue to use a Filemaker-Pro database to track student performance. Dr. Blundell has written and received a grant through Vision 2011 (http://www.csc.edu/csc2011/) funding for enhancement and continued support of this effort. Unit faculty are planning to review web-based student-performance-tracking software to install for accreditation, departmental, faculty and student use.