On Friday, February 23, campus information technology (IT) professionals gathered for the half-day Continuous Improvement in Technology (CIT) Conference, known as CITx. The keynote was presented by Dr. Thomas Keyser, the founding dean of Illinois State University’s College of Engineering.
Dr. Keyser, who was hired in April 2023, shared with the audience about his background in engineering and his roles at other universities. He introduced several members of his leadership team and talked about the timeline and vision for getting the new college up and running. Next steps include hiring a director of equity and inclusion and at least six faculty members. The first cohort of students is expected to start in fall of 2025, with the main physical location, a renovated John Green Building, to be completed in fall of 2026. Keyser was able to share with this group about the kinds of technical needs he foresees for the program in the future.
When asked about the task of recruiting students to a brand new program, Dr. Keyser espoused a collaborative approach to attracting and retaining students: “Instead of those programs that tell their students to look to their right and left and know that only one of the three of them will still be here in a few years, we want our students to look to their left, look to their right, and take in those faces. We’ll tell them it’s their responsibility to have all three of them finish the program.”
The IT News session, presented by tech leaders from across campus, featured updates to campus systems and processes. The updates included a preview of the upcoming new mobile app, improvements to My.IllinoisState.edu and web search, a new software request process, and the next IT service management (ITSM) software to be used at Illinois State.
The CIT Student MVP Award is presented at the CITx conference, and this year it went to Nichol Brown, an instructional technology assistant with the Center for Integrated Professional Development (CIPD). Brown provided front-line support in the conversion from ReggieNet to Canvas, the new learning management system, this past year. Along with developing and cofacilitating on 18 training workshops, she also developed faculty resources for the CIPD website.
Runners-up this year for the CIT Student MVP Award included Natalie Simova from the Technology Support Center (TSC) and Stephen Pytel, who works with the Infrastructure Operations and Network (ION) area of Tech Solutions.
Following IT News, Redbirds of a Feather breakout sessions wrapped up the day—the sessions focused on finding your purpose, questions about the ISU network, knowledge management, and artificial intelligence at Illinois State.
The annual CIT Conference will be held the first week of August 2024. The conference is open to Illinois State’s IT community, including faculty, staff, and students, all of whom are welcome to submit presentation proposals and to attend the conference. Learn more about upcoming deadlines on the CIT Conference website.
