Spring 2024 CIS Service Reminders

Welcome back! We hope you all had a good winter 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: Spring 2024 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

During the first weeks of spring classes the help desk team will be present in the Shanahan Center for proactive classroom AV support.  We are regularly checking the status of av in classrooms. You can find the latest av health issues on this page. There is a full list of rooms and av equipment in this document: AV Equipment in Class/Meeting Rooms.  

We have three 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.

If you are planning to use technology such as laptop carts, lecture capture, document camera, or DVD player 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.

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. 

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 this coming Fall 2024. Please keep this in mind, especially if you have new materials or a new course to work on.  

Spring 2024 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 Spring 2024 course sites have also been created in Canvas. All faculty have been added to their respective course sites. Students were added on January 3, 2024. Unlike in Sakai, Canvas sites are created in Unpublished status. Faculty must publish their course sites in order for students to see them. Canvas updates at the top of the hour, every hour from 7am to 6pm,

7 days a week.

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 fall, we introduced the Adobe Creative Cloud for our students. Our subscription enables students to obtain 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.

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
• Chat: helpdesk.hmc.edu 
• Phone: 909.607.7777
• Sprague 1st Floor