Portals provide the following features

• Gateway - The system identifies approved users through a single sign-on procedure
• Security - Users are allowed to access information they can see, change information they can change, and no more.  Those who should not see or change information are denied access to it.
• Personalization - Users are able to edit how their portal will look and the sources of information that will be available on it.  On the left hand side of this page from UCLA students can change the theme for their portal.  While visiting this page, take a moment to see the different types of information that can be provided to a student.

Portals provide the following information

• Channel Information - Channels can be configured to provide information from internal and external sources. Examples might include the weather, news, entertainment, shopping and/or stock information, campus sports, newspapers, etc.  This demo from Princeton University provides channels from ESPN, ABC News, local weather, and a search engine.  Clicking on the misc.  tab near the top of the page provides access to Yahoo and Salon.  Channels can contain a broad collection of information from the Internet and on some systems can be selected by the user.
• Pushed Information - Universities and users, to a lesser extent, can select which constituencies should receive information they consider important, for example, sending this to all students, to particular majors, or to students of a specified interest. This can be a diverse collection of information, faculty class announcements, campus calendars, social announcements, student government activities, etc.  The left side of the UW Personal Page (choose "Enter as a guest" from the first page) is an example of how information can be pushed to students, in this case all students.  Based on the data collected it is possible to segment and selectively push data.  
• Customized information - The user receives information for or about themselves. For a student this might be a course schedule, degree checklist, bill balances, or a reminder that a library book is due.  My UBC is a good example of the types of information that might be sent.  Another example is available from the California Institute of Technology .

Portals provide the following tools

• Internet tools - Search and navigation engines for information over the university intranet, university web pages, and the entire Internet are available. Tools to save favorite web sites, create home pages, and create or post message boards are accessible.   MyUCLA users can create their own  bookmarks ( scroll down on left side to "Modify My Links," which then show up on the portal page.
• Personalized tools - Users can create their own planners, calendars, to do lists, contact and project managers, real-time chat, message boards, original content on every imaginable topic, shopping, free home pages, "clubs" which function as makeshift intranets, small business services, and much more.
• Workflow and application integration - Staff and faculty can access data and applications needed to do their work in a real-time environment creating personalized data reports and tracking indicators. Paper documents can be replaced with web-based forms and tracking software.

Portals can promote the following relationships

• Interaction - Portals can be interfaces to chat, e-mail, threaded discussion, and bulletin board postings on a variety of subjects.
• E-business - Portals that are integrated into university back-office operations can become a one-stop interface for educational transactions over the web.

Questions to consider

• What types of content make a campus portal an important information resource for your campus?  Something that users will return to because of the value it provides them.
• How do you reach this decision on content for your campus?

Additional Information

Institutional Information Portals, Carl Jacobsen (EDUCAUSE REVIEW, July/August 2000, pdf file requires Adobe Acrobat)