ContentsOIT Success .........................................................................................4

Data Center Improvement Project .......................................................................................................4UA System Scholars Institute ...............................................................................................................5Multimedia Services Video Group Wins Telly Award .........................................................................6Banner Upgraded .................................................................................................................................6Disaster Recovery .................................................................................................................................7VoiP Pilot Testing .................................................................................................................................7

Green Initiative ...................................................................................9Homegrown Alabama Farmers Market ...............................................................................................9Buy Local ..............................................................................................................................................9Drive Up Recycling ...............................................................................................................................11

Staff Updates ........................................................................................12Mike Webb Retires ................................................................................................................................12New IT Service Desk Employees ..........................................................................................................12New Baby ..............................................................................................................................................12OIT Job Openings.................................................................................................................................12OIT Office Scapes: Secret Office ..........................................................................................................13

PSA News & Events .............................................................................14PSA’s Web for Dummies Materials .......................................................................................................14Outstanding Professional Award .........................................................................................................14

Technology News .................................................................................15Learning Online in Real Time .............................................................................................................15UA Mobile App Now Available .............................................................................................................17

For Your Information ..........................................................................18OIT Employees Work on Bamarelief and Seek and Find Websites, CNN ..........................................18UA Acts of Kindness Fund ...................................................................................................................18Tornado Relief Efforts Continue ..........................................................................................................19Pronto ...................................................................................................................................................19Online Staff Directory ..........................................................................................................................19

Meetings & Webinars ..........................................................................20Health & Wellness ...............................................................................21

Employee Health and Fitness Month ...................................................................................................21Mental Health .......................................................................................................................................22

Project Updates ...................................................................................23Secret Office Answer ...........................................................................24

OIT Success

Data Center Improvement Project

The Data Center improvement project continues. One change is using overhead routing for both power and data distribution.

Since all electrical and data feeds to the equipment on the floor are overhead, this clears the mass of cables under the floor, improving air flow and providing a much more easily managed power and cable system.

This will prepare the OIT data center for hosting systems currently located across campus and facilitate future growth.

The power track system on the lower level is complete, and the final floor lift installation is complete. The hy-draulic lift has just been installed for moving equipment between levels. Fiber migration for external network connections has been completed. The labeling and cabling standards work is nearing completion. Over the next six weeks, network equipment will be moved.

The new design alternates hot and cold aisles. The goal of such a layout design for server racks and other com-puting equipment in a data center is to conserve energy and lower cooling costs by managing air flow. Server

racks are lined up in rows with cold air intakes facing one way and hot air exhausts facing the other.

The rows composed of rack fronts are cold aisles and the rows the heated exhausts pour into are called hot aisles. The cold air comes from floor vents facing cool aisle intakes and the overhead returns that pull hot air through the ceiling vents are located by the hot aisle exhausts.

UA System Scholars InstituteThe Fourth Annual UA System Scholars Institute, “Technology and Learning … What’s New, What’s Needed?”, was held on Tuesday and Wednesday, May 10 – 11, 2011 at the Bryant Conference Center. View photos online.

The Office of Information Technology (OIT) presenters included Ashley Ewing, Rachel Shuttlesworth, Kevin Halbrook, Rick Dowling, Jana Motes, Reata Strickland, and Karen Bybee. Felita Winn, IT Service Desk Coordi-nator, attended as the presider for Dr. Isabelle Drewelow.

John McGowan, Karl Aldag, and Marilyn Staffo along with members from the College of Continuing Studies served on the planning committee.

Thanks to all from OIT who contributed as presenters, consultants, and presiders. View videos of the keynote speeches and other presentations.

The UA System Scholars Institute is for higher education IT staff, distance learning professionals, faculty who use instructional technology to augment traditional classroom instruction, and instructional technologists who teach or develop online and blended courses.

Multimedia Services Video Group Wins Telly AwardOIT’s Multimedia Services video team, led by Rick Dowling, won a Telly Award this year for their Graduate Re-cruitment Video.

The Telly Awards recognize creative excellence. Judges evaluate entries to recognize distinction in creative work — entries do not compete against each other. Instead, entries are judged against a high standard of merit.

The Telly Awards was founded in 1978 to honor excellence in local, regional and cable TV commercials. Non-broadcast video and TV program categories were soon added. Today, the Telly is one of the most sought-after awards by industry leaders, from large international firms to local production companies and ad agencies. With over 200 categories, more organizations than ever are eligible to participate.

Banner UpgradedOIT’s Enterprise Development and Application Support (EDAS) staff upgraded to the latest versions of Banner 8 for Student Receivables, Accounts Receivable, and Financial Aid on May 22. Thanks to all the EDAS teams and Tammy Jones from our Project Management Office for their collaboration on this project.

OIT’s goal is to keep the University current with Banner. Also, this version was needed for the upgrade of De-greeWorks.

It is important that UA stay current with Banner product offerings that will help with other Sungard products such as DegreeWorks with regards to support as well as functionality.

Disaster RecoveryThe OIT Continuity of Operations/Disaster Recovery project planning has been completed. The next phase will involve acquiring and setting up the equipment in the Gordon Palmer data center.

Once the networking, security, storage, and server platforms have been fully configured and tested, the equip-ment will be relocated to the off-site facility in Atlanta. Current expectations are for the infrastructure and foun-dation services to be fully operational by the end of the year. The backup mission critical applications will then be set up at the Disaster Recovery location.

OIT’s Disaster Recovery strategy, in order to best respond to the various disaster scenarios, includes a secondary facility on-campus and an out-of-region Disaster Recovery center in a hardened facility (our off-site facility in Atlanta).

The on-campus facility is in the already designated facility in the Ridgecrest South parking structure. It provides local redundancy to core network services. Most mission critical data and application servers would not be provisioned in that facility but certain systems like the Police application and possibly the Medical Center appli-cations may be more effectively and less expensively replicated there. In that case, the data for these applications would still be replicated in the out-of-region facility.

We are using the latest technologies in the Disaster Recovery facility to fully virtualize and minimize space re-quirements to help keep costs down and remote management up.

The effectiveness of our Disaster Recovery strategy depends on the completion of the campus core network im-provements. The Disaster Recovery Foundation setup team is validating backup and retention strategies as well as finalizing power, rack unit, and network port requirements now.

VoiP Pilot TestingA pilot testing of Cisco VoIP technology began the week of May 19th with a limited number of internal users and will last six to eight weeks. If this pilot doesn’t reveal any serious issues or concerns, a full pilot implementation including all of OIT in Gordon Palmer will be undertaken this year. If the pilot programs are successful, then the technology would be available as an option for new buildings, major renovations, or strategic deployments.

Voice-over-Internet protocol (VOIP) is a new technology used to make phone calls over the Internet. VoIP runs both voice and data communications over a single network, which can significantly reduce infrastructure costs.

Green Initiative

Homegrown Alabama Farmers Market

Starting May 5th, you should consider visiting the Homegrown Alabama Farmers Market, which runs every Thursday from 3-6 p.m. on Canterbury

Episcopal Chapel’s lawn (the corner of Hackberry and 9th) from May 5th-October 27th.

Each Thursday the market will feature local produce and beef, good music, chef demos, kids crafts and more. Click here to go to the homegrownalabama.org website.

Homegrown Alabama is a student-led group at the University of Alabama that seeks to educate students about the value of local produce, as well as to foster partnerships between local farmers and the University of Alabama.

Its partners include Canterbury Episcopal Chapel, Alabama Farmers Market Authority, UA Office of Community Affairs, Students for Sustainability, New College, the Center for Com-

munity-Based Partnerships and the SGA Department of Environmental Concerns.

Contact this group by e-mail at homegrownalabama@gmail.com or call the market manager at (205) 210-9621.

Buy LocalSource: http://www.sustainabletable.org/issues/eatlocal/

The basic concept is simple: local foods are produced as close to home as possible. Buying local supports a more sustainable food system because true sustainability goes beyond the methods used in food production

to include every step that brings food from farm to plate.

Local vs. sustainableSustainable agriculture involves food production methods that are healthy, do not harm the environment, re-spect workers, are humane to animals, provide fair wages to farmers, and support farming communities. Sus-tainability includes buying food as locally as possible. Buying local food does not guarantee that it is sustainably produced. Pesticides, chemical fertilizers, factory farming, hormone use, and non-therapeutic use of antibiotics can all be involved in local food production, so it’s important to make sure that the local food you buy is from farmers or gardeners using sustainable methods.

When considering the sustainability of a product there are a lot of questions to ask, so if a store or producer is advertising that their food was raised locally, take the time to ask a few questions like: “Do you know how these animals were raised?” or “Do you know the name and location of the farm where this product was grown?”

Local vs. globalAt its roots sustainable farming benefits the local community and local economy while supporting the environment by enriching the soil, protecting air and water quality, and minimizing energy consumption.

Industrial food production is entirely dependent on fossil fuels, which, when refined and burned, create greenhouse gases that are significant contributors to climate change. The biggest part of fossil fuel use in industrial farming is not transporting food or fueling machinery; it’s chemicals. As much as forty percent of the energy used in the food system goes towards the production of chemical fertilizers and pesticides.

By adding transportation, processing and packaging to the food system equation, the fossil fuel and energy use of our current food system puts tremendous stress on the environment. For example, between production and transportation, growing 10% more pro-duce for local consumption in Iowa would result in an annual savings ranging from 280,000 to 346,000 gallons of fuel, and an annual reduction in CO2 emissions ranging from 6.7 to 7.9 million pounds.

Food processors also use a large amount of paper and plastic packaging to keep fresh food from spoiling as it is transported and stored for long periods of time. This packaging is difficult or impossible to reuse or recycle. In addition, industrial farms are a major source of air and water pollution.

Small, local farms are run by farmers who live on their land and work hard to preserve it. They protect open spaces by keeping land in agricultural use and preserve natural habitats by maintaining forest and wetlands.

By being good stewards of the land, seeking out local markets, minimizing packaging, and harvesting food only when it is ready to consume, farmers can significantly reduce their environmental impact. In fact, studies show that sustainable agricultural practices can actually increase food production by up to 79% while at the same time actively reducing the effects of farming on climate change through carbon sequestration.

Drive Up RecyclingIf you have recyclables, bring them to the drive-up containers behind the Ancillary Services Building (located behind the 15th Street Diner) at 1114 14th Street.

Staff Updates

Mike Webb RetiresMike Webb has retired after working 33 years in OIT. He began working here in 1972 through 1979 and returned in 1985-2011. In the early nine-ties, he began working in security.

His immediate plans are to visit Disney World with his wife and grandkids and to spend time on the beach. He says, “What’s most important is spending time with family.”

He looks forward to having time to do all the things he never had time to do when working full-time. His wife just bought them memberships to the recreation center. He also plans to become more involved with the Tuscaloosa City School

system where his 6 and 14-year old grandkids attend school at Northridge and Southview. OIT held a retirment party for Mike on May 26th in A306 Gordon Palmer.

New IT Service Desk EmployeesNakeidra Sanders, daughter of Anita Cutts (EDAS), began working as a student consultant on the service desk on May 18th.

She is a freshman at UA. Please welcome her to OIT.

As of May 16, Sheila Morgan had made a complete transition from the Faculty Resource Center to the Service Desk.

New BabyKim McIntyre (Desktop Support) had a baby boy. His name is Jackson, and he was born on May 5th.

Jackson weighed 6 pounds and 3 ounces and was 19 inches long. He has a big brother, KJ. Mother and baby are doing well. Kim will return to work in June.

Congratulations to Kim and family!

OIT Job OpeningsOIT has an internal job of IT Technician IV or IT Infrastructure Technician II open for current OIT employees. If you are interested in applying, go to the Human Resources website. Interested OIT staff should apply at http://

jobs.ua.edu/.

OIT Office Scapes: Secret OfficeCan you guess whose office this is? Find the answer on the last page of this newsletter! It is interesting to look into staff offices that you’d not get into on a regular basis. We’ll have a picture of a different office every month. If you have a submission, please e-mail gtinney@ua.edu for the next issue.

PSA News & Events

PSA’s Web for Dummies MaterialsThe Professional Staff Assembly has a slew of great materials on its website for anyone interested in Web develop-ment. Just check out the Web for Dummies section.

With links to Web Communications’ Web Guide, the PSA site has templates, themes, and other helpful down-loads to get you started on building your own site at UA. Also available are UA’s Web Images Library and UA’s WordPress themes with directions on how to use them.

Are you interested in using social media but don’t know where to get started? Then review the presentation on Social Media Best Practices and Recommendations. There are cheat sheets and glossaries as well as lots of info on HTML, CSS, PHP, and helpful teaching resources.

If you are interested in what is good Web practice and good Web design, you will find links to materials from Web Tide, the official blog of the UA Web Design community.

Even if you are at the stage of wondering what WordPress is then you will find materials suitable for you. Or if you are skilled enough to want information on “How to make custom page templates in WordPress,” then you will not be disappointed. There is a Crash Course in Web series covering HTML & CSS, WordPress & PHP, and Javascript Libraries – jQuery. For more information on the PSA, go to psa.ua.edu.

Outstanding Professional AwardOutstanding Professional Award nominations ended April 4 and the winners were announced at a reception May 19. If you were nominated, you will receive an invitation to the awards reception.

Technology News

Learning Online in Real TimeBy Vanessa Rusch

When chemistry graduate student Jacquelyn Turri found herself stuck in an ice storm more than 800 miles away from campus this past February, she immediately knew that missing her Bioorganic Reaction Mech-

anisms class wasn’t an option.

“With this type of course, it’s difficult to keep up with the material, so missing even one lecture would have put me behind in my studies.” This left Turri with one option: She immediately contacted her professor, Dr. Patrick Frantom, to alert him to the situation.

“When Jacquelyn emailed me on Sunday, Feb. 20, that she was stuck in Madison, Wis., due to heavy winter storms and that she wouldn’t be able to leave until Tuesday, I wanted to make sure she wouldn’t get behind in class. Since this class is participating in the College of Arts and Sciences iPad initiative, I first attempted to find an app that would allow me to stream the class over the Internet, but was unsuccessful.

“When I checked the Faculty Resource Center website to see if they had any suggestions, I noticed Wimba was software the University had and it did exactly what I needed,” said Frantom.

Wimba Live Classroom software allows faculty and students to share virtual space in real time, including audio, video, applications, files and other content. Across UA’s campus, classes in every college have had much success with this software in their distance learning programs. For a traditional, lecture-based classroom to set up a vir-tual classroom with such short notice highlights the accessibility and ease of using this software.

“It was simple to add Wimba to my eLearning class page, and it was the best option since Jacquelyn had access to a computer and the Internet. That Monday morning, we gave it a try right before class. She was able to see

everything I did on the SmartPodium white board [interactive classroom monitor] and we were able to hear each other as well. This allowed her to actually ask and answer questions during class. The live broadcast went very well, and Jacquelyn stayed current with the class despite being over 800 miles away!”

As director of emerging technology and research for the Faculty Resource Center, Dr. Rachel Shuttlesworth was very pleased with Frantom’s success in using Wimba.

“One of Wimba Live Classroom’s main strengths is its ability to bring real-time collaboration and interaction to the online environment.

Participants can easily give feedback to a presenter, making the class go more smoothly,” said Shuttles-worth. “However, as with any technology tool, users may face technical issues and need to have contin-gency plans and flexibility.”

According to Turri, “The best aspect of using Wimba was that because I could participate in the lecture by asking questions and answering example problems — it made me feel like I was actually there. There were some problems though,” she continued. “For example, after I would virtually raise my hand to speak to the class, my screen would freeze for approximately 30 seconds. This was a little frustrating since the class was wait-ing for me to say or type something and I was unable to do so.

“But overall, Wimba was really easy to set up and very simple to use. I was really happy to have this type of alter-native available, and I would definitely recommend this tool to other professors and students in situations like mine.”

Frantom agreed with Turri’s assessment. “I think, for a small class, if a student does have to be away for some reason, this is an easy way for the student and professor to stay on the same page.”

This scenario of using a new technology to solve a problem is the standard method Dr. Marilyn Staffo, director of the Faculty Resource Center, finds most faculty members turn to when it comes to integrating new technologies into the classroom. “Most faculty decide to adopt new instructional technologies to help solve an instructional problem. They are usually pleased after they have learned to use a technology that meets an instructional need.”

The Faculty Resource Center has several methods of keeping faculty aware of the availability of new technologies like Wimba on campus.

“The FRC sends communications about new technologies to faculty through various lists and through the col-lege and school technology support staff,” said Staffo. “We provide workshops, online tutorials and individual assistance for the wide variety of instructional technology resources available campuswide.”

“As enrollment increases and more programs are offered online, UA’s use of instructional technology tools like Wimba Live Classroom will certainly grow,” said Shuttlesworth. “Online learning won’t replace our campus learning experience, but it will augment it.”

For a detailed listing of UA instructional technology, workshop information and registration, tutorials, support and solutions, please visit the Faculty Resource Center at frc.ua.edu.

“One of Wimba Live Class-room’s main strengths is its

ability to bring real-time col-laboration and interaction to

the online environment.”

UA Mobile App Now AvailableThe UA Mobile Application is now available at http://m.ua.edu/app/. The UA mobile app keeps you connected, even while on the go. This suite of apps provides instant access to the campus directory, map, news, Crimson Tide sports, library catalogs, class schedules, and more! This is the official mobile app for The University of Ala-bama. Download it today.

UA worked with Blackboard Mobile to create this mobile application (initially focused on the iPhone and Black-berry platforms). It is compatible with the iPhone, iPod Touch, and iPad and requires iOS 3.1.3 or later.

For Your Information

OIT Employees Work on Bamarelief and Seek and Find Websites, CNNOIT Multimedia Services (MMS) employees have been using their talents on building websites to support torna-do relief efforts. Stephen Lovell worked on the bama relief website, and Reata Strickland assisted on the Seek and Find website. MMS student assistant Tobias Hackstedt took photos of storm damage as an iReporter for CNN (see his photo below). These are just some of the ways OIT staff have contributed to tornado relief efforts.

UA Acts of Kindness FundThe UA Acts of Kindness Fund, established to support an emergency assistance program for UA employees and students, has collected more than $2 million and continues to grow. You can give online or have your donation payroll deducted.

The Acts of Kindness Fund is to provide appropriate relief to faculty, staff and students of The University of Ala-bama who experience a qualifying emergency or hardship, such as a tornado, fire, flood, medical emergency, or any circumstance which calls for immediate action following a sudden and unexpected happening.

If you suffered a hardship as a result of the April 27 tornado, you are encouraged to apply for assistance through the fund. Go to the UA Acts of Kindness Web page and fill out the UA Acts of Kindness Application for Financial Assistance. E-mail the completed form and supporting documentation to uakindness@fa.ua.edu.

For more information about the fund, visit http://financialaffairs.ua.edu/benfund/. If you have questions or need more information, please call (205) 348-6690, or send an email to adickey@fa.ua.edu.

Tornado Relief Efforts ContinueFor information on UA’s tornado relief efforts, see the UA Storm page and http://www.ua.edu/tornadorelief/. To donate to the Salvation Army, text “GIVE” to 80888 and donate to the RedCross by texting “REDCROSS” to 90999. Contact the local chapter of the United Way to contribute to community relief efforts at http://www.uwwa.org/. The UA Community Service Center also has a Facebook page listing volunteer opportunities and a website at http://www.volunteer.ua.edu. Also, please visit http://www.givetuscaloosa.com/.

ProntoThe Center for Teaching and Learning is the latest campus office to start using Pronto. Any area that would like a demo and information on setting up Pronto should contact Rachel Shuttlesworth. Wimba Pronto is adver-tised as the “only instant communication platform designed for educators to advance and promote collaborative learning” having “unique features” such as blended audio and video conferencing, instant messaging, application sharing, a state-of-the-art whiteboard, queued chat for tutoring and office hours, and automatic population of classmates and courses. Wimba Pronto also is the only instant collaboration platform powered by wind.

Online Staff DirectoryOIT has an online staff directory on the Sharepoint site. It includes photographs taken by our Multimedia Ser-vices photographer, Teresa Golson. For a current listing of OIT staff, log into OIT Central and go to the Custom-er Relations’ Shared Documents folder. It includes job titles, office and phone numbers, as well as a description of job responsibilities.

Meetings & Webinars

• Our Desktop Support team is preparing for its Dell Hardware certification.• The FRC continues to assist faculty with Spring 2011 issues such as how to create online exams, how to adjust the eLearning grade book, and how to communicate with students. The FRC is collaborating with CCS and eTech on end of Spring 2011 issues.• Marilyn Staffo, Kevin Halbrook, Jana Motes, Jereome Wiley and Rachel Shuttlesworth met with represen-tatives from Turning Technologies who talked about updates to the student response system (clicker) appli-cations. The representatives also met with SUPe store staff and Chris Walston.• The FRC hosted a Mobile App “Speed Dating”: Share Your Favorite Apps session on May 19th. • Marilyn Staffo is participating in the Blackboard 9.1 online cohort.• Kevin Halbrook participated in a webinar from Panopto.• Dana Mathewson and Susan Hunter are attending the Blackboard Learn 9.1 Upgrade Cohort Program this summer. One hour meetings are held each Monday from May 16 – Aug 15.• The EDAS Business Admin team attended a Microsoft Powershell webinar on May 16.• On May 12, Susan Hunter attended the Campus Technology Virtual Conference 2011.• Bryan Carmichael and Trent Gooden attended a demo for the iDashboards business intelligence product on May 13.• Bryan Carmichael and Trent Gooden attended a webinar “Data Mining with Excel” on May 12.• Clay Davis, Bryan Carmichael, Kelly Swinney and Trent Gooden attended a training webinar “0 to Cube in 60 Minutes” on May 12.

Health & Wellness

Employee Health and Fitness MonthSource: http://physicalfitness.org/nehf.html

Employee Health & Fitness Month (EHFM) is an international and national observance of health and fitness in the workplace, created by two non-profit organizations, the National Association for Health and Fitness and AC-TIVE Life. The goal of EHFM is to promote the benefits of a healthy lifestyle to employers and their employees through worksite health promotion activities and environments. Formerly National Employee Health & Fitness Day, Employee Health & Fitness Month has been extended to a month-long initiative in an effort to generate sustainability for a healthy lifestyle and initiate healthy activities on an ongoing basis.

Employers everywhere are invited to participate in EHFM. Throughout EHFM employers will challenge their employees to create Healthy Moments, form Healthy Groups, and develop a Culminating Project. Participants will be able to log these activities on the EHFM website throughout the month, allowing employers and employ-ees to track, share, and promote their individual and group activities.

Healthy Moments are occasions of healthy eating, physical activity, or personal/environmental health. Examples include: going for a walk; cooking a healthy meal; participating in an exercise class; quitting smoking; schedul-

ing a health assessment and going to the doctor.

Healthy Groups are formed to create a sustainable activity continuing even beyond the month. Examples include: walking, jogging or cycling interest groups; healthy recipe or healthy lunch groups; sports teamThe Culminating Project is an event or project that promotes health through-out the whole company or community. Examples include: planning a company 5K; planting a community garden; cre-ating a company or family fitness event; adopting a company-wide physical activity standard or policy

EHFM is held during the month of May every year. Healthy Moments occur daily, even multiple times a day and are created by individuals and groups. Healthy Groups implement activities to be performed several times throughout the month. Finally, the Culminating Project is developed during EHFM and executed at the end of May.

Employers and employees all over the world implement and participate in healthy activities conveniently at the workplace and within their communities. EHFM is a great way to kickoff wellness and fitness programs, and bring excitement and compliment existing programs. Worksite wellness programs have been shown to benefit the employer through enhanced employee productivity, improved health care costs, reduced employee absen-

teeism, and decreased rates of illness and injuries. These programs benefit employees by lowering stress levels, increasing well-being, self-image, and self-esteem, improving physical fitness, increasing stamina, increasing job satisfaction, and potentially reducing weight.

EHFM provides fun and innovative ways to incorporate wellness at the workplace. Benefits of EHFM include a free tool kit provided to wellness coordinators to help guide activities and events; promotional items advertising EHFM to employees; ability to log and track moments, groups, and projects; option to implement friendly com-petitions and challenges to increase motivation and build teamwork; simple and adaptable to any wellness and fitness program; and create sustainable healthy programs, environments, and policies.

EHFM is presented by the National Association for Health & Fitness (NAHF) and ACTIVE Life. For more infor-mation visit: www.healthandfitnessmonth.org.

NAHF is a non-profit organization that improves the quality of life for individuals in the United States through the promotion of physical fitness, sports and healthy lifestyles. NAHF accomplishes this work by fostering and supporting Governor’s and State Councils and coalitions that promote and encourage regular physical activity. For more information visit http://www.physicalfitness.org/

ACTIVE Life is an Austin-based, 501 (c) (3) non-profit organization. Its mission is to make healthy the norm by enlisting and equipping people and places to build and sustain healthy communities. For more information visit http://www.activelifehq.org/.

Mental HealthSource: http://www.mentalhealthamerica.net/go/mayMental Health America is celebrating mental health month, which began in 1949 to raise awareness of mental health conditions and mental wellness for all.

This year Mental Health America is addressing these important issues through two themes: Do More for 1 in 4 is a call to action to help the 1 in 4 American adults who live with a diagnosable, treatable mental health condi-tion and the fact that they can go on to live full and productive lives.

The second theme, Live Well! It’s Essential for Your Potential, focuses on the importance of mental wellness and the steps you can take to improve your well-being and resiliency in the face of difficult times and challenges. Mental Health America’s Live Your Life Well program offers ten science-based tools to manage stress and help you relax, grow, and flourish.

These proven tools can help you feel stronger and more hopeful. Check out each page for specific, easy-to-follow tips. Connect with others; stay positive; get physically active; help others; get enough sleep; create joy and satis-faction; eat well; take care of your spirit; deal better with hard times; get professional help if you need it.

Project Updates

• Wimba’s campuswide implementation continues as support model and technical/reliability issues are resolved. • One cabinet of the UAHPC (UA high performance computing cluster) is almost cleared of running equipment. There will be a brief downtime of the UAHPC to finish removal of an Ethernet switch in that rack. This process will remove capacity from the UAHPC while keeping the core system online, allowing us-ers to migrate data off.• Required replacement components are here for RC2, the UAHPC (high performance computing) cluster replacement. The network connectivity and configuration have been completed and soon the software will be installed. Longer cabling for some disk arrays has been ordered. RC2 will allow integration of computing resources purchased by other departments into an OIT-managed cluster system.• Cable trays have been installed in the Telecom fiber/equipment room and the cables are being rerouted. Hiller Systems is making the required fire suppression additions.• The first full run of 1500 feet of cable for the Magnolia Drive Development Project is in place and the 2nd run should be done by May 8th. This project involves the installation of a data and phone infrastructure to support new sororities being built on sites where New, Byrd, Parker-Adams and Wilson are now.• Networking/Telecom is putting the fiber in place from Rose Administration to Tutwiler and from Bryant Denny to Tutwiler to keep Maintenance up and running during the Magnolia Project.• Networking/Telecom is running fiber and telephone cable from Capstone Village’s main building to out-side of 507.• Networking/Telecom has completed rewiring the Mineral Industries Building (MIB) (the areas affected by the removal of the back wings at the end of the semester).• Networking/Telecom has run 1400 feet of fiber from Gordon Palmer to ATO.• Desktop Support has completed replacing computers for 95% of the first group in the Arts & Sciences’ computer replacement project. • Rachel Shuttlesworth, John McGowan, Karl Aldag, and Ivon Foster are working with the Law School to gather 508 compliance information for some of the instructional technology tools (Live Classroom and Bb Vista). Voluntary Product Accessibility Templates have been received from the vendor.• Conversations with Blackboard continue regarding Learn 9.1 and its integration with Banner and con-nection through Luminis. The transition away from eLearning must be complete by the end of 2012. Next Tuesday Blackboard reps will visit campus to discuss Learn 9.1, Analytics, Mobile Learn, and more.• EDAS implemented the Advancement Back Office application on May 18.• Justin Young upgraded the Footprints test environment to version 10 on May 19.• Business Objects (TideBytes) software upgrade on May 24th will provide additional features and func-tionality. The pilot groups are the Action Card Office and Contracts/Grants. • OIT has completed the data and phone infrastructure for 527 Capstone Village, running 650 feet of con-duit, installing three pull boxes, pulling fiber and copper, and installing data and phone jacks.• On May 31, OIT will begin CAT5e wiring in the Science and Engineering Complex as part of phase III of the project: installing the data and phone infrastructure. • Networking/Telecom has run fiber to athletic facilities (softball, baseball, tennis, soccer, etc.) as part of the Athletics/WVUA Fiber Project.• Demonstrations with SunGard and Perceptive Software were scheduled for May 25 and 26 for the Cam-puswide Document Imaging System project.• The Common Directory team met to compare data attributes to what already existed in LDAP. Deb Crocker added needed fields. The team will finalize the attribute list for the first phase of the project in a June 1st meeting.

• The UA Network Upgrade project is progressing with all the core MPLS switches and routers in their respective closets around campus. There is lot of fiber work that must be completed before interconnecting everything. OIT fiber technicians will be working to complete this over the next 3-4 weeks. We have received two new 7606 routers to replace the 7609 routers to conserve space in the core closet racks.• We are beginning installation of the CIT equipment for the Cisco Network Academy. Wiring of the room has begun as well.• Wi-Fi Protected Access (WPA/WPA2) is ready to deploy to the rest of OIT.

Secret Office AnswerAthena Farris sometimes needs to hear “that’s so easy” even when faced with difficult tasks. Luckily, her aunt gave her an EASY button she can hit that will tell her just that--”That’s so easy.”

Athena said that recently she had a difficult job to do as part of the OIT EDAS team put-ting the Math Placement tests online so that students could take them at home for their first try. She could hit her EASY button telling her “That’s so easy,” helping her to com-plete this hard job.

Athena says, “It makes you feel better. Me and my coworkers.” She says luckily she has a supportive family there to help her through more difficult situations, but it never hurts to have an easy button.

She says, “Some days I hit the easy button just so I can actually say I have done something easy today.” Often when her team leader Francisco Reyes comes into her office and assigns her a task she responds by hitting the easy button which loudly proclaims, “That’s so easy.”

She also has a collection of Dr. Seuss items in her office in A347 Gordon Palmer. She has a Dr. Seuss calendar and pen holder and admits to having a pen fetish.

Athena is a Programmer Analyst Senior with our Enterprise Development and Application Support (EDAS)group working on Admissions and Human Resources projects. She attended UA, earning a B.S. in Commerce and Business Administration with a minor in computer science. Athena has been programming since she was ten. She and her husband have no kids but are big kids themselves, enjoying their yearly visits to Disney World.