Click here to receive your FREE subscription to Campus Technology
Opinion
Bankrolling IT Infrastructure
9/12/2006
By John Moore
Every investment in IT infrastructure presents a classic double whammy: An organization has to budget for the initial deployment and maintain funding to keep the technology working. Neither task is easy for university administrators, given funding constraints and plenty of competition for the available dollars. But schools hoping to stretch their budgets as far as possible have some techniques at their disposal. Try these tactics for making every dollar count in such infrastructure areas as storage, wireless, and network servers.
Think Strategically
Looking at the big picture can yield benefits when it comes to IT infrastructure investment. That’s particularly the case with storage, frequently overlooked as an expenditure that should be carefully managed. Organizations often tack on storage as a matter of course whenever they purchase servers. As a result, the storage outlay flies under the investment-management radar.
The University of New Hampshire, however, has devised a storage strategy that involves consolidating storage into a centralized service. Tom Franke, assistant VP and CIO at the school, says the approach “will let us look more comprehensively at our storage needs,” which in turn will help UNH get more out of its infrastructure investment. Server-attached storage, the university’s previous approach, typically limits the full utilization of storage resources. That’s because storage bound to one server can’t be used by other servers. A centralized, shared storage service, however, unlocks storage from individual servers and promotes improved utilization. Indeed, Franke cites higher utilization as one of the goals of UNH’s storage strategy.
Due to its distributed nature, server-attached storage also tends to drive up support costs. UNH commissioned GlassHouse Technologies, a storage consultant, to study its storage environment, and discovered that the school’s support costs per unit of storage were “on the expensive side,” says Franke. He hopes that the centralization strategy will help make UNH’s storage infrastructure more efficient, though he notes that the university’s IT group was a fairly lean shop to begin with. How much money UNH will save has yet to be determined; Franke says it will take about a year for the school’s storage vision to be fully realized.
Consider Ease of Deployment
In some cases, the technology itself may free up dollars to invest in its deployment.
Hobart and William Smith Colleges (NY) sought to establish a wireless infrastructure for student and faculty internet and e-mail access. Mike Ruiz, network and systems engineer at HWS, found that many wireless solutions required considerable preparation: site surveys, capacity planning, and user-density forecasting. “There’s a huge up-front time investment,” he says.
Recommended Reading
- Getting the Money Right
A clear sign that online and distance learning is maturing is that we are struggling with how to organize and fund these programs on an ongoing basis.
- Technology and Campus Services
Can auxiliary services be mission-critical? You bet they can. With tuition on the rise, Auxiliary Services departments at a variety of colleges and universities are proving that they can innovate and still save their parent institutions cash.
- Ad It Up
Commercials on television tend to enrage me and laugh tracks are guaranteed to give me a headache. Plus, where do people find the time to watch TV?
- What Is the Purpose of an Electronic Portfolio? Is the Answer the Key to Your Successful Implementation?
Among many themes, Margaret Price explores the theme of purpose in her Viewpoint. One purpose of ePortfolio is to reflect on change from a beginning to a later point in time. In a future Viewpoint, Margaret will return to the SpEl.Folio and we’ll see how her thinking and her project have evolved.
- Making Faculty Smarter about Smart Technology
If you’re not also enabling the ‘why’ or ‘what’ behind the tech tools you give your faculty, you’re not enabling effective use of those tools.
- Smashing the Shackles of Intentionally Dysfunctional Technology
Until last week, it hadn’t "clicked" inside my head that the Library of Congress could or would make specific exemptions to copyright laws.
