Creating Campus Portals, Part II - Partnering with Others

Today we offer the second of three ways you might create a campus portal: partnering with other colleges and universities. The best example I could find of college partnerships is a consortium of universities calling themselves the JA-SIG Clearinghouse Portal Framework Project. (JA is short for Java and SIG an abbreviation for Special Interest Group) You may have read an article about this in the Chronicle of Higher Education last May. This is an open standard effort, meaning the code is shared without cost from one university to the next, and uses java, XML, and other technologies for much of the basis of the effort.

The JA-SIG may be a worthwhile alternative for campuses that have technical expertise, but lack the ability to create a portal on their own. It also is a workable approach for campuses that have home-developed student data and registration systems that do not connect easily to vendor software.

Today's page http://weber.edu/portals/partner_with_others.htm provides links to four campus demos of the JA-SIG portal, and a link to the Portal Project web site which includes a significant amount of information and background on this effort. If the JA-SIG approach has potential for your campus, I would encourage you to spend additional time at the Portal Project web site. This provides information on how to join this project, current progress, and technical capabilities.

On Wednesday, Oct. 18th, Steve Gilbert and I will be participating in an eColloquia webcast on portals. The eColloquia is being hosted by HorizonLive and WebCT. If you or some members of your campus community are interested in participating in this event, you can register at the following url - http://www.webct.com/ecolloquia/viewpage?name=ecolloquia_event_5 The eColloquia is free but advanced registration is needed. To register you will need to provide your name and email address. You will not receive any unsolicited e-mail as a result of this registration. The webcast is scheduled for 2 pm eastern time, but will be archived and available after the live feed.

Our next lesson will examine the third alternative for creating a campus portal: using vendors that specialize in developing and supporting campus portals. I enjoy hearing from you and appreciate the time you take to read and respond to these materials.

dave