Coopera'on  among  French  Universi'es Khadija  Dib  French            Ministry  of  Higher  Educa5on  Yves  Epelboin  UPMC-­‐Sorbonne  Universités  &  UNR  Paris-­‐IdF  

# 3

Coopera'on  among  French  Universi'es  :    Regional  Digital  universi'es  

www.enseignementsup-recherche.gouv.fr

Ministry  of  na'onal  educa'on,  higher  educa'on  and  research  

A global vision for a digital, open, lifelong and flexible education

•  Law  on  new  basement  for  the  Republican  School  (July  8th  2013)  

•  Law  on  higher  educa5on  and  research  (July  22th  2013)  

•  Digital  agenda  (october  2nd  2013)    –  France  Universite  Numerique    

•  a  brand  •  a  portal  

•  a  na5onal  plaQorm  for  MOOCs  and    distance  learning  

A national strategy

More autonomy for all universities and institutions (law on liberty and responsibility 2007). •  Groupment of universities and institutions in HE and

Research based on a geographical neighboorhood •  Each institution has its own digital strategy

but a national answer is required •  coherence within the community •  equity of treatment for each student •  the lowest cost •  pooling and sharing •  innovation •  coping with French specificities about distance learning

Background

2003: A national initiative to provide funding for major operations through a new organization called “Digital Regional Universities (Universités Numériques Régionales)“ Strategic objectives: • Development of digital services on campuses to provide to the academic community, primarily to students, digital services such as podcast, unified portal access and basic tools, computer loans… • Development of an infrastructure to facilitate the access to these services: WiFi, networking…

• Support for the use of these digital services

Background(2)

The UNR are based on a relation between: •  The Ministry of HE and Research •  The regional government •  The consortium of the local universities and other Higher

Education Institutions

The Ministry provides the initial impulse through its funding The regional government and the consortium add their own funding

The achievements are periodically reviewed before starting a new contract.

Examples of cooperation in France

•  RENATER: National Internet infrastructure for Education and Research

•  UNT (Universités Numériques Thématiques): a national initiative about Open Educational Resources since 2004 •  per discipline •  Peer reviewed •  With national grants

•  FUN-MOOC:a national MOOC consortium

http://www.france-universite-numerique.fr

The 17 UNR

2003  Phase1  with  10  Regions  

2006 :  Phase  2  with  15  Regions  

2008  :  17  Regions    (total  cover  of  the  country)  

Development of digital services on campuses Digital workspaces (ENT)

• Access   to   Student   Information   Systems:   timetables,   grades,  diploma,...,  • Information  &  communication:  email,  forums,  ...,  • Desktop  services,  • Access  to  LMS,  • Library  &  Documentation,  • Podcast,  video,  

level  study   taught  disciplines  

Development of digital services on campuses Digital workspaces (ENT)

• Social  services,  University  Life,  • Corporate  Relations,  A  common  technology  for  a  vast  majority  of  universities:  uPortal  and  a   community   to   share   experience   and   developments:   ESUP   (more  than  80  members)    

https://www.esup-­‐portail.org/  

Mobility In   2009   the   Ministry   planned   to   consolidate   the   wireless   Wi-­‐Fi  networks  of  Institutions  with  impact  on:    

• development  of  nomadism  • improvement  of   living  and  working   students’   conditions   (access   to  their  timetables,  pedagogical  learning  contents  ...)  • Special  support  of  a  common  initiative  from  UNR  Paris  Ile  de  France:  Eduspot  

Development of an infrastructure to facilitate the access to these services

Eduspot

Why Eduspot? Eduroam, the European common Wi-Fi infrastructure access, managed by GEANT, requires a complex installation on personal computers and is not available from public computers. An easier technique was required to encourage Wi-Fi access from any campus: Eduspot What is Eduspot A captive portal nationally available to all students and staff from most campuses, dormitories… A common national SSID in all universities: eduspot A Shibboleth based authentication system 112 institutions members of the network

https://services.renater.fr/mobilite/eduspot/

C2I Information Technology and Internet certification A national certification opened to all incoming students, managed, at local level, by academic staff from the institutions, members of the UNR for computer literacy: Basic level Advanced level:

Law Engineering Teaching Health Environment Organization and communication

http://c2i.education.fr/

Support for the use of these digital services

Political policy implementation

Several areas: -­‐      Promotion and communication among students and teachers, - Training of students (Certifications), - Training of teachers: oriented assistance devices for the production of educational contents.

Support for the use of these digital services

www.unpidf.fr

Paris  Île-­‐de-­‐France  Digital  University    

36  Institutions  

450 000 Students  50 000  Staff  (Searchers,  Teachers...)  

An example: UNPIdF

Staff training Registra'ons  

Distribu'on  of  staff  Academic  

Support  

Students  Quality  

Sa'sfac'on  

Teacher  Answer  to  need  

Number  of  ins'tu'ons  

Number  of  classes  

91.3%  

Filling  of  classes  

Student multipurpose card

One common student card for all universities (450 000 students) Student ID with picture Access to libraries on campus and in most other universities Access control on campus Access and payment to students restaurants and cafeteria Payment of facilities: vending machines, copies, printing…

Professional ID card for staff in many universities Professional ID with picture Access control Access and payment to staff cafeteria Facilities

Digital university user’s guide

A common user’s guide with 16 common pages + 16 pages for each university: Two editions, one for students, one for staff Since 2008, from printing to digital versions

UnivCloud

Why? •  Establishments  partners  mandate  UNPIdF  (November  2010  ...)  

•  Improved  services  :  More,  Better,  Faster  

•  Quality  of  services  (24/7)    /  PRA,  PCA,  PSSI  

•  Optimization  of  process    /  Industrialization  

•  Team  undersized  /  Easy  Deployment •  Saving  Energy  /  Infrastructure  Optimization •  Thrift  of  scale  /  Reducing  the  carbon  Footprint  

•  Pooling/  Best  effort •  Payment  services  to  use  /  Innovative    Economic  Model  

•  Target  Infrastructure  «  Private  Cloud  Community  »  

UnivCloud

When?  

•  End  of  study  project  :  31  july  2013  •  Writing  specifications  leading  to  tender  :  January  2014  •  AMOA  (Integrator  Functional  /  Technical)  •  First  Infrastructure  deployments  :  end  2014  /  begin  of  2015  

Where?  

•  POC   (Proof   of   concept)   in   Paris   Région   Île-­‐de-­‐France   /   Partners  Involvement  

•  Reproducible  at  the  National  level  (Pooling  and  co-­‐construction)  •  National  Recommendations  on  Cloud-­‐Computing  

Rue des Facs

A question and answer service born from a complex geography .

Operational since January 2009 and carried today by 27 university libraries in Île-de-France.

Ruedesfacs.fr now covers all fields of knowledge. More than 1500 are answered annually. Since 2011, many answers are placed on a "research notebook" hosted by hypotheses.org, one of three platforms of research development proposed by OpenEdition (Cleo). This book receives more than 40,000 visits per year.

www.ruedesfacs.fr

The Digital Shop

Best bargains in Paris area for hardware and software

Restricted to students, staff and family of UNR members

Impact  of  UNR  actions

New  services  Regional  offer  for  staff  training  to  the  digital  world  Simplified  schedule  access,  exam  dates,  documentation,  educational  platform,  universities’  restaurants  and  dormitories...  Development  of  infrastructures  for  mobility,  Interoperability   of   Information   Services   with   urbanization   of   the  Information  Systems  and  standards.  More  robust  technical  infrastructure  Qualitative  impacts  A   national   Dynamics   based   on   a   common   work   from   actors   with  different   profiles   (CIO,   President,   Vice-­‐President...)   from   various  Institutions,   Mutualization   aid   and   support   by   sharing   resources,  ideas,  significant  projects  (difficult  to  achieve  on  an  individual  basis.)  

Discussion(1)

Impacts are of several kinds: • First, all students enrolled in universities have now access to a bunch of free digital services and resources related to their studies : student system, e- education , podcast, multiservice student card, communication tools and e-mail , documentation, academic life, relationship with companies and potential employers... • 100% of the spaces, dedicated to the students, are equipped with Wi -Fi connections, to encourage the use of numerous services available through laptops, tablets or phones. • In addition to quantifiable inputs , the cooperation between universities Impulses national projects through a dynamics and synergy between teachers , CIO , ICT staff and librarians.

Discussion (2)

Cooperation between universities is a key factor to enable all universities to offer a quality ICT environment at an affordable cost. Other similar initiatives exist all around Europe. The US Higher Education system is very different from the European ones. However the French experience might be of interest to other universities to embark on this path with solutions adapted to their own environment. Among them sharing practice and software in all common fields, opening Wi-Fi access to all the community, local initiatives for staff development…