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Annual Inventory Process Updates

By • On • In Employment

Based on experimentation during the previous academic year, Alma generated documentation for a new method of inventorying the equipment in the Digital Media Services loan program. By using the category inventory tool within the loan management system, advisors are able to correct errors in equipment names, equipment categories and capture a time-stamped record of the equipment asset tag. The process was faster and generated more actionable data on the over 2,800 items that were inventoried.

Simultaneously, Alma pilot tested the use of the built in help desk ticketing system for broken or missing equipment. This system had not been used to its greatest potential previously, but the DMS permanent staff are eager to use it to streamline the process of assessing equipment, resolving issues and tracking repeated problems.

The combination of all of this additional data will reinforce recommendations for equipment repair or repurchase.

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Kaltura System Growth Statistics

By • On • In Employment

In August 2014, Alma became the System Administrator and Subject Matter Expert for the Loyola University Chicago instance of Kaltura (branded Loyola Media).

Comparing September 2014 to September 2015, the number of items played increased by 117%, the number of plays increased by 84% and the total minutes viewed increased 251%.

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Equipment Loan Program Website Updates

By • On • In Design and Web

Alma and a colleague reviewed and updated the online list of items available through Loyola’s Equipment Loan Program. Alma spearheaded the visual changes, avoiding the square pictures previously used on the website and in management proposed redesigns. The final design features equipment photos in an extreme landscape aspect to facilitate a more equal visual presence for all types of equipment items.

In tandem with this visual shift, all of the content was updated and reorganized, the new organization being heavily based on the Equipment Loan Binder which was finalized two months previous. This reorganization reduced the number of menu items from 24 to 19 future-proof categories.

The website is based on the T4 content management system.

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Annual Equipment Inventory

By • On • In Employment

In preparation for a new academic year, Digital Media Services uses the summer months to process new equipment inventory. This new equipment is added to the equipment loan program to replace old or broken equipment and to expand the offerings to students. During the summer of 2015, over 700 pieces of new equipment was tested, documented and inventoried in the WebCheckout equipment scheduling and reservation software.

In addition to the cataloging process, video and print documentation and support were created for equipment.

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Educause Proposal Reviewer for 2015 Conferences

By • On • In Presentations, Volunteering

As a member of Educause, Alma had the opportunity to review proposals for the 2015 Conferences planned for San Diego, Atlanta, and San Antonio. She reviewed ten proposals for the San Antonio conference April 22 – 24, 2015.

Reading the proposals provided insight about hot topics within higher education and technology as well as details regarding conference programming as it functions on a large scale for a nationwide organization. The chief takeaways were the manner of descriptive criteria that were included in the proposal feedback system, and the various formats that were available for topics which did not lend themselves to traditional presentations.

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iPads and Mobile Computing in Education

By • On • In Instruction and Curriculum Development, Presentations, Teams and Groups

This presentation has gone through three incarnations, and each of the three has been a different experience.

There are two programs at Loyola University Chicago that involve iPads or other tablets being issued to students, specifically for course work. All told, Alma has prepared and delivered five such presentations and developed an in-depth online training and support resource for anyone interested in using a tablet or mobile device in their courses.

Continue Reading →

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Atomic Learning Pilot Workgroup – Subject Matter Expert

By • On • In Teams and Groups

In an effort to transition from on-ground training and support to online, self-paced training and support, Loyola University Chicago entertained working with several repositories of video tutorials. When it was time to begin a pilot of one service, Atomic Learning, Alma was integrated in to the core workgroup as a Subject Matter Expert on student use of online, video-based software support.

The group was charged with reviewing system strengths and limitations and assessing the impact of those limitations on our planned implementation of the system. Throughout the pilot Alma encouraged the student workers she supervises to use the system for individual enrichment and for the academic support of our clients. At the end of the defined pilot time the group gathered feedback from students, faculty and staff on their use of the online-learning system. After the survey was closed, Alma assessed quantitative response from survey of system users, coded qualitative responses and compiled survey results in an executive summary to guide higher-level leadership in decision to adopt the system.

After the adoption of Atomic Learning, Alma assisted in the development and implementation of comprehensive marketing schema to target students, faculty and staff via print and electronic media, events and organizations.

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Can We Help You? Video for Loyola DMS

By • On • In Instruction and Curriculum Development, Productions, Teams and Groups

Annually, there are massive updates to the online training courses for the Digital Media Services student workers. While planning media to highlight the vast array of equipment available through the department’s Equipment Loan Program, the team of supervisors differed in their ideas for what the video in training should look like.

Alma created storyboards for the three video variations and shot the footage for all of the videos simultaneously. Then she edited the video to each of the storyboard specifications. The video below is meant to promote the use of the equipment loan program because of its equipment selection and the friendliness of the staff. While students are not supposed to remember the entire list of equipment pieces, they should walk away with the impression that we have just about anything they need.

Alma shot the video using a Canon EOS 5D Mark II. She edited the footage using Adobe Premiere CS6 with titles from Adobe After Effects CS6.

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Sustaining Productivity Presentation at LUC Tech Day 2014

By • On • In Presentations, Self-Teaching

Using Evernote to embrace digital notetaking

There are a myriad of notetaking solutions available now, but Alma found Evernote first. Alma presented about Evernote and how it shortens the time between scribble and recycle. She can digitize, photograph, clip, crop, speak-to-text and embed with Evernote to save just about anything she needs to take note of. Then once the note is in the cloud, it can be organized by notebooks and tags. Alma can search the full text or OCR and even set a reminder. All of the above in any combination or permutation needed to get things done.

View the complete presentation from TechDay here (link uses Adobe Connect).

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CCUMC Presentation- Computer Labs: Typing to Digital Media Powerhouses

By • On • In Presentations, Teams and Groups

Alma presented this with her Digital Media Services colleagues at the CCUMC (Consortium of College and University Media Centers) Conference in Oak Brook, Illinois in October 2013.

The presentation focuses on the evolution of on-campus computer labs throughout the past decades, from the time when personal computers were prohibitively expensive and dial-up internet created issues for family houses to now. The ubiquity of mobile computing and cloud software has placed a very different set of demands on computing spaces, including fast access to printing or kiosks, high-power creative and statistical software, and access to protected databases.

The presentation is available for review here.

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