Fall 2023 CIS Service Reminders

August 16, 2023

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Welcome back! We hope you all had a good summer break. We’re sure you have many questions, especially about technology in the classrooms, so please read below and feel free to send us an email at the Help Desk if you have more questions or concerns. 

Course Mailing Lists

Course mailing lists have been created in Google Groups. You can see your course mailing lists in your My Groups list or get a full list of all course mailing lists at: Fall 2023 Course Mailing Lists on Google Groups. We have also created a Google Group for all courses that have multiple sections. For example, bio-23@g.hmc.edu contains all faculty and students associated with all 5 sections of Bio 23. These lists will be automatically maintained just like the other Google Groups for courses. 

Classroom Support

We have organized a support plan to have a person available on each floor of Shanahan for the first two weeks of classes to help with AV.

You can find a full list of which rooms have what equipment in this document: AV Equipment in HMC Class/Meeting Rooms. There are 9 Shanahan classrooms with audio amplification and wireless microphones. The Galileo Auditoria also have audio amplification and wireless mics. We have extra mics available in case you would like your own mic to use in these rooms.

If you are masking in class and are in a larger classroom (40 or 50 people) you may be interested in our personal voice amplifier sets. Please email the Help Desk at helpdesk@hmc.edu if you’d like to try out or check out one of the personal voice amplifier sets or if you would like a personal wireless mic. 

We have several laptop carts, which are stored on the second floor of the Shanahan Center for use throughout the building. Laptops are made available on a first come, first served basis. If you’d like more information about the laptops and how to reserve them, please visit  the Laptop Cart Reservation Service Catalog Page. You can find a full list of the software that is included on the laptops and the CIS lab computers in this document: Lab Software in CIS Managed Labs and Carts. Please contribute to this collaborative list for specific software requests for the upcoming academic year. 

If you are planning to use technology such as laptop carts, clickers, lecture capture, document camera, DVD player, or laptops in your class this semester, please don’t wait until the last minute to submit requests. To request the use of any of the technologies described above please send an email to the CIS Help Desk at helpdesk@hmc.edu or use the AV Request form. We need at least 48 hours notice to serve you well.

During the first two weeks of fall classes the help desk team will be present in the Shanahan Center for proactive classroom AV support. 

Lecture Capture

Harvey Mudd College uses MediaSite for lecture capture recording. We have dedicated lecture capture equipment in 8 classrooms plus one mobile recorder. Additional details for lecture capture can be found in the Lecture Capture Service Catalog Page. Over the summer we have enhanced our recording capabilities with newly installed lecture capture recording systems in Shanahan B442 and 3460 and a ceiling mic array in Shanahan B442 so no need to wear a microphone for lecture recordings. We added two auto tracking cameras in B442 and 3460.

Sakai

If the roll out of Canvas continues as well as it has been, we are expecting that we will have transitioned completely to Canvas by Fall 2024. Please keep this in mind, especially if you have new materials or a new course to work on.  

Fall 2023 Sakai course sites were created and have been populated with faculty and students. Sakai will synchronize with the portal three times per day at 12:30 pm, 5:30 pm and 2:30 am. If you have not yet requested a site that combines multiple sections of a course, this would be a good time to do so. If you’re having trouble finding and organizing your sites in the Home site, please read our Tips and Tricks for Organizing Your Sakai Sites. 

If you’re still working on your course site and don’t want students to be able to see it yet, you can temporarily unpublish your site by going to Site Info/Manage Tools.

Canvas

All Fall 2023 course sites have also been created in Canvas. All faculty have been added to their respective course sites. Students will be added Monday August 14.Unlike in Sakai, Canvas sites are created in Unpublished status. Faculty must publish their course sites in order for students to see them. If you haven’t requested a course that combines multiple sections for your courses in Canvas, now would be a good time to do so. To add auditors or TAs to your Canvas sites, please contact the CIS Help Desk at helpdesk@hmc.edu or 909 607 7777. You can also contact Canvas support directly 24/7 by going to the Help menu in Canvas.

Course Mudd Shots

Course Mudd Shots have been updated and are available in the HMC portal.

Adobe CC, Gradescope, Zoom, and Piazza

In the coming weeks, we will be introducing the Adobe Creative Cloud to our student community. Our subscription enables students to obtain named user licenses, granting them the ability to download the software onto their personal computers. 

We currently have institutional licenses for Gradescope and Zoom. The licenses cover all faculty, staff, and students at HMC. We no longer have a site license for Piazza, however. Faculty who wish to use Piazza should contact their department chair for funds to purchase an instructor license. All three tools are integrated with Sakai and Canvas. Please be sure to read the documentation on how to integrate these tools with Sakai since there are a few gotchas! More documentation is also available on the CIS Gradescope service catalog page, the CIS Canvas Support service catalog page, the CIS Zoom service catalog page and the CIS Piazza service catalog page.

Wi-Fi Updates

This summer we made several changes to Wi-Fi across campus to improve stability and performance. We have been testing Wi-Fi across campus, and so far, those tests have gone very well. We’ve also received confirmation from folks who are on campus this summer that Wi-Fi has indeed improved. If you had Wi-Fi problems last semester and you’d like to come to test before classes start, we’d be happy to test with you. 

We will continue to test Wi-Fi, but if there’s a specific room or area that you’d like to have us do targeted testing for added peace of mind, please reach out to the CIS Help Desk and let us know.

CIS Help Desk

The help desk will be open from 8 AM to 5 PM Monday through Friday for walk up, email, chat and phone support.

We can be reached via the following methods:

  • Email: helpdesk@hmc.edu
  • Online chat: helpdesk.hmc.edu 
  • Phone: 909.607.7777
  • Sprague 1st Floor

This email is also available as an IT News item. 

Have a great Fall 2023 semester!