AIT&L Merges with UCit and University Libraries
by Michael Lieberman and Victoria Montavon
In mid-December, President Zimpher announced leadership and organizational changes at the Academic Health Center that would promote further integration of programs and services across the East and West campuses. Thereafter, working groups were appointed to consider how greater efficiencies and synergies could be achieved in several functional areas. One of the units chosen for review was Academic Information Technology & Libraries (AIT&L). At the end of February, the administration accepted the recommendation to merge the Information Technology (IT) function of AIT&L with the Instructional and Research Computing division of UCit and to merge the Health Sciences Library with University Libraries.
The transition period currently underway takes into account the evolution of the AIT&L organization over the past fifteen years. The initial mission of providing libraries to serve four colleges (College of Medicine, College of Nursing, College of Pharmacy, and College of Allied Health Sciences) was steadily expanded to include a wide range of IT services and support for various units of the Academic Health Center. In addition, a web development group within AIT&L provided services to many units at the university beyond the Academic Health Center. With the growth of these services, AIT&L’s financial support was broadened to include the East campus provost’s office, the College of Medicine, and the Office of Research. Additional IT functions provided by AIT&L consisted of electronic classroom support at the College of Medicine, online testing support for the College of Medicine, exam grading (via scantron), establishment and maintenance of the IT equipment for the clinical competency development and assessment facility (CCDA), creation and maintenance of an east campus server consortium (providing file and print sharing to all participating units), and web application, development and maintenance for many units across campus. AIT&L also provided instructional design assistance for College of Medicine faculty.
The overall goal of the reorganization of AIT&L is to provide efficiencies and savings through the merger of the IT and library functions with the two centralized units of the university – UCit and University Libraries.
The Health Sciences Library will be under the direction of Leslie Schick, and will continue to provide the same excellent service that East campus patrons have come to expect. Leslie will report to Dean Victoria Montavon, University Librarian and Dean of the University of Cincinnati Libraries.
The incorporation of IT services within UCit allows for effective collaboration between groups that was not fully realizable before. The Instructional and Research computing group within UCit is responsible for, among many services, electronic classroom support, exam grading, instructional design, and digital video. The classroom and exam grading units on East Campus will synergize well with west campus services, as will the digital video services. The web services group on East campus will synergize well with a similar group within core operations of UCit. And, finally, the server group within east campus will team well with the Blackboard and UCFileSpace server groups, located within Instructional and Research Computing. As long as current funding is maintained, the services currently offered by the IT groups within AIT&L will be continued to serve East campus customers.
The library and IT professionals of the former AIT&L have worked well together as a team for many years now. Both units are scheduled to return to their former totally renovated space in the MSB/CARE building in late July.
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