MERC

MERC Institutional Representative Meeting

March 20, 2003 Meeting Minutes

Meeting was called to order by Craig Klimczak, Chair.

Revised MERC Governance Structure - Craig Klimczak

Klimczak explained that the strategic planning process and changes recently incorporated into the Governance Procedures were to improve the leadership focus of MERC. He explained that the revised procedures now have MERC making policy issue decisions and allow MOREnet to gain needed input on operational issues as needed. This enables MOREnet to integrate the leadership on the operational side with the leadership they have from both state government and K-12.

In more detail, Klimczak shared that what transpired with the Governance Procedures this year was trying to refocus this organization at a higher level of IT leadership within organizations. The public 4-year institutions have a sub-committee of COPHE, the COPHE CIO Committee, that takes forward IT proposals and recommendations to CBHE and legislators. Recently, it had been decided that the 2-year public and independents/privates should be included in these discussions. When trying to identify how to include these groups, it was decided that using MERC and moving MERC into a leadership role in the state would enable us to drive and establish statewide policies with leadership from institutions statewide. The MERC Governing Board is now called MERC Institutional Representatives and the MERC Executive Committee will instead be the Board of Directors. Similar to the Executive Committee except that now we'll have 2 representatives from each segment on the Board of Directors. This was done to ensure that each segment has a policy voice. The officer structure will remain the same where each year we elect a chair-elect and the chair-elect progresses form chair-elect to chair to past chair. There will be two-year terms for the Board of Directors.

To determine representation, letters were sent to the CEO's asking them for their nominations. A fairly good response was received. However, for those institutions where we didn't get a response, we sent an email and said that if they didn't respond to the email that we'd assume they had no changes.

Shifting from standing committees to ad hoc task forces. The standing committees were having challenges regarding what they were supposed to be doing. Meetings were happening with no agendas. This structure was not helping us move forward on the leadership side and we needed to sever that tie with being an operational organization. If you are currently on a standing committee, you may very well be called on from MOREnet in an operational role via Ad Hoc task forces. Several possible task force topics have been discussed at the HELIX conference.

Rickman voiced that he is in favor of having ad hoc task forces and also agreed that we have some upcoming issues that could be handled via these task forces.

Klimczak asked for applause for all of those coming on board, and leaving.

Reports

MOREnet Update - Bill Mitchell

Mitchell again thanked the out-going members for their last 3 years of service.

He went on to share that the network has been staying up and has been responsive. We are working on concepts of our next generation network. The network design we have now is in its 4th or 5th year. Doing a technology refresh on our core. Keeping the same core equipment, but we're refreshing with a faster processor to keep up with demand and we are looking at what's next. There is a national initiative of looking at the higher education community in particular and state networks in general.

MOREnet is in the 2nd semester of pilot classes with Centra's e-conferencing tool. Trying to determine whether this is a tool that MOREnet should provide for a fee-for-service environment.

Financially at this point in time, the MOREnet core network appropriation has not taken any cuts.

Mitchell discussed the University of Missouri is currently looking at how IT resources can be leveraged via restructuring.

Rickman asked if there was any update from the Joint Legislative Oversight Committee? Mitchell explained that the JLO committee is commissioned jointly by the House and the Senate. The JLO Committee reviewed the report, but took no action and it will not be released unless further action is taken. We received a very complimentary report that we'd like them to make public, however, at this time we are unsure of what will happen.

Legislative Update - Tony Wening

Wening reported that the Education Appropriations committee didn't cut any MOREnet monies and that in the House Budget committee they simply validated what the Education Appropriation committee proposed and didn't take any additional action. MOREnet also escaped without any withholds for FY03.

MOREnet attributes this success from two things. First, we stopped talking about technology and started talking about impact and values. Secondly, was due to all of you. Your presidents and lobbyists having done a great job of letting people know the value of MOREnet.

Mitchell added that MOREnet is funded by 3 different sources:

• Direct appropriation through the University
  
• Public library appropriation in Secretary of State's Office
  
• House Bill 2 in DESE for K-12 program

The State Budget and Planning office said that was a little confusing so they recommended a transfer of funds from DESE into the University of Missouri/MOREnet line. That created a little confusion for some as they took it to be that MOREnet received a $5 million budget increase, when in fact, it was just a transfer of funds.

DHE Update - Nancy Devino

Devino reported that the Missouri Learners Network is moving along. They've been working to augment the information available on MLN to assist institutions with revenue generation and have been looking into searchable databases across many institutions. It will be a huge benefit to the K-12 community to have teaching professional development opportunities listed in one place.

Devino mentioned that she has been in a project representing the Midwest Higher Education Commission sponsored by MICTA and that AT Alliance Consortium, a Consortium of the four regional higher education compact to look at e-learning solutions that might be of benefit to the campuses. They've been looking at aggregate pricing for those products and an RFP process is nearly complete. The awards should be announced by early April.

She mentioned that CTI, the Coordinating Board's Committee on Technology and Instruction, is undergoing some revisions and that DHE is trying to turn that around because there is a need for more practitioner level input and they're going to try to make those issues complimentary to what MERC is doing. At the same time, the goal is to stretch across the sector boundaries to incorporate some K-12 folks and some library folks who have a vested interest in the outcomes of all of the technology decisions that are going on in the state. Whether they go through and decide that they will also report or at least advise the state board of education and the Secretary of State's office is their decision to make. DHE could then provide some additional input from the coordinating board to make sure their decisions are in line with the needs of everyone, not just higher education. They are also looking at taking up issues such as distance learning policies and data collection in the State.

Devino stated that this year, as in all years, we are "running behind" on getting final decisions on the budget. We always seem to be in this place until about the middle of May of each year. She stated that they are engaging in a significant education process with legislators about the transfer of DESE funds to HB3. She mentioned that the budget request for campus technology infrastructure was not carried forward to the Governor this year because of the budget situation.

Board of Directors Elections

MERC Board of Directors - FY04

• Chair: Greg Burris
  
• Chair-Elect: Mary Peterson, Don Doucette
  
• Past Chair: Craig Klimczak

Board Members At Large

Meeting adjourned at 10:00 a.m.

Back to Top