http://pscbc.blogspot.com/2013/03/cuny-first-computer-system-to-aid.html Skip to main content Search This Blog [ ] [Search] Brooklyn College PSC-CUNY CUNY First Computer System to Aid Administrative Control over Colleges at the Expense of Efficiency and Effectiveness * Get link * Facebook * Twitter * Pinterest * Email * Other Apps March 20, 2013 Guest Post Every once in a while I get a question, either privately or in a department meeting, regarding CUNYFirst. Here is what I know of CUNYFirst, based on a few years of working with the project as a "training liaison" (which is a fancy term for room-scheduler). (1) The idea of CUNYFirst is a good one: to have a unified, integrated "enterprise"-scale system that encompasses all university/ campus business processes. Such a system could, in principle at least, have saved a lot of expenditure on maintaining dozens of disparate, redundant, barely cooperating third-party systems. Such a system could have offered information access that would have benefited the administration, the staff, the faculty, and students. (2) CUNY Central's motives in pursuing CUNYFirst were dominated by an agenda that has nothing to do with such benefits however. Rather, CUNY Central sought absolute control over all college activity, including curriculum. Think of it: whoever controls the catalog, the bulletin, the transcripts, and the apparatus in general effectively controls curriculum. CUNYFirst will be part of the arsenal by which CUNY Central shoves Pathways down our throat. CUNY Central also sought the knowledge of and therefore access to any discretionary funds that the colleges may have. (3) The negotiations that were the run-up to the purchase of CUNYFirst were a travesty. The project required an expenditure of up to a billion dollars to do it right. CUNY Central offered far less. All but one of the bidders dropped out as a result: the project could not be done properly with what CUNY offered. Oracle-PeopleSoft did not drop out. However they warned CUNY that for that level of funding, they could not, would not CUSTOMIZE: they would only CONFIGURE. CUNY Central was so eager to have a centralized MIS tool to use for its own centralizing, corporatizing agenda, that it totally ignored the implications of the Oracle "configure-only" limitation: business processes would have to be made to fit Oracle, not vice versa. Capabilities that we now have will vanish. The staff, the faculty, the students would just have to "adjust" (the technical term being "suck it up"). (4) And thus, CUNY has spent about $600 million dollars on a system that makes things worse everywhere it goes. The actual cost far exceeds the $600 million dollars that go to Oracle. Because processes are now much more inefficient, more people have to be hired to do tasks that were formerly automated. Unknown and unseen to most faculty has been the toll that this takes on HEOs and to some extent clericals -- the people who actually make the university run. (No, professor colleagues, you are important but you do NOT make the university run-- that is another discussion.) HEOs have been forced to put in all sorts of extra hours without compensation. Some of this is transitional, some of it is systemic. (5) CUNYFirst does work. It just works badly. * The interface is laughable: It looks like an early-90s update of 3270 bi-synch technology. Web 2.0? Ha. Not even Web 1.0. * Because CUNY wouldn't pay for customization, we had to renumber our courses. This is just one of many, less visible to faculty, changes that CUNYFirst has forced. * The security model is totally inappropriate for CUNY: we will have work-study students performing tasks that require vast permissions, thus allowing them to access data of other students. * HR has had to struggle with the "problem" of an individual being a grad student enrolled in one campus serving as an instructor at another campus and having a part-time office job in a third. GM and Apple don't work that way. But CUNY does. (6) We at Brooklyn College (and other "Wave 3" campuses) WILL adjust. I know people in other schools (in earlier "waves") who have. We will suffer more than they have because Brooklyn College has had the best add-on systems (for scheduling, grade reporting, etc) of the university. Many of these will now go away. (7) I witnessed some of the early testing. It was done by following a test script that the vendor provided. As it failed multiple times, an engineer from Oracle would run to the next room to adjust something and then the testers would re-try. I've heard though that they've improved this process somewhat. (9) Have you read all the way to this? Must be a slow day for you. Well, the thing to keep in mind is that no matter how bad CUNYFirst is for YOU, CUNYFirst is a success for CUNYCentral -- see point (2). David Arnow Professor Computer and Information Science Brooklyn College CUNY First * Get link * Facebook * Twitter * Pinterest * Email * Other Apps Comments Post a Comment Popular posts from this blog 93% Vote No Confidence in Pathways June 01, 2013 The referendum votes have been tallied: a total of 4,322 votes were cast, out of a total number of 7,202 possible votes: a 60% turnout. Of those, 3,996 full-time faculty agreed that they have No Confidence in Pathways, with only 323 voting Disagree (and 3 void ballots). An absolute majority of the full-time faculty are on record as having no confidence in Pathways. That is a stunning rebuke to the new curriculum and the coercive process used to implement it. I will send a longer message to the entire membership shortly, but for now I want to congratulate you all on your extraordinary collective effort in defense of our students' right to a rigorous education. Equipped with this result, we can take the campaign to a new level in the fall. In solidarity, Barbara Bowen Read more CHAPTER LETTER CAMPAIGN: to President Michelle Anderson December 10, 2023 Image In the Fall of 2023, we asked all departments or units to write and sign letters to the college President, Michelle Anderson. We wanted her to know what our colleagues do well. We wanted her to hear our vision for work and mission at Brooklyn College. We wanted her to understand what we all need to thrive. We wanted to model a mission-driven discourse, not a workplace lead by austerity. We wanted our President to hear us. Professor Naomi Braine reads the Sociology Dept Letter Professor Jillian Cavanaugh reads the Anthropology Letter Twelve letters, signed by 100s of our colleagues were submitted--although many more were penned (many felt uneasy about being visible in this way). 1) Synthesis letter signed by over 80 faculty and staff 2) Sociology Department , 26 signatures 3) Anthropology Department, 16 signatures 4) Accounting Department , 14 signatures 5) Library , 28 signatures 6) PRLS , 6 signatures 7) Psychology Department , 30 signatures 8) English Department , over 100 signat Read more Powered by Blogger BC PSC Visit profile Archive * 2023 8 + December 2 + April 1 + March 4 + February 1 * 2021 14 + November 1 + October 3 + September 2 + May 1 + April 2 + March 1 + February 2 + January 2 * 2020 20 + November 1 + October 2 + September 1 + August 3 + July 3 + June 1 + May 3 + April 4 + March 1 + January 1 * 2019 15 + November 3 + September 1 + June 1 + May 1 + April 2 + March 3 + February 3 + January 1 * 2018 15 + December 2 + November 1 + October 2 + September 1 + June 1 + April 2 + March 1 + February 2 + January 3 * 2017 15 + December 2 + November 2 + October 4 + September 2 + July 1 + March 2 + February 2 * 2016 4 + October 1 + September 3 * 2015 3 + October 2 + May 1 * 2014 33 + October 2 + September 3 + July 1 + May 1 + April 6 + March 6 + February 11 + January 3 * 2013 58 + December 5 + November 4 + October 5 + September 2 + July 5 + June 8 + May 13 + April 12 + March 4 o Trustee Profile: Union Busting Lawyer, Peter Pantaleo o BC Provost Threatens to Ignore Faculty Council Vot... o CUNY First Computer System to Aid Administrative C... o Brooklyn College Faculty Council Censures Administ... 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