Portal Annual Report 2012/13 Introduction This report is provided for a diverse audience and covers the year 1st September 2012 31st August 2013, the seventh year of operation of the Portal. The Portal supports student education through providing easy access to module resources (VLE areas, timetables, reading lists, past exam papers), library resources and skills support. It also makes an important contribution to delivering an exceptional student experience through bringing together a huge range of university resources via one login, and through targeting and personalisation of announcements, content and links. The Portal continues to underpin the Library strategy, being the main way for students to access the library electronically. The Portal is used by students as their online way in to everything and they consistently expect that anything important will be provided through the Portal. The Portal is also used by graduates, staff, and some undergraduate applicants. Statistics Some headline statistics (more details in Appendix 1): 40,161 different users logged in during October 2012 (a slight decrease on last year, probably due to the small reduction in student numbers); Nearly 2 million total logins/month at busy periods, about half a million/month in the summer; An average of 2,704 staff per month used the Portal; The maximum number of users logged in at any one time was 3,275 at 11:40 on 21 st January 2013. This was less than previous years due to providing a separate login to Student Services at busy times such as Online Module Enrolment and exam results day. Concurrent use is frequently over 3,000 during term-time weekdays and the Portal copes with this level of loading very well. Achievements 1. Transfer to new hardware in February improved the robustness and maintainability of the infrastructure. 2. The main priority for the year had been agreed as planning and preparation for the Next Generation Portal, to replace the current Portal software (Luminis). This included: User consultation: Extensive consultation with both students and staff about priorities for the Next Generation Portal (through focus groups, reps meetings, questions in the annual Portal Feedback Exercise, and staff open meetings) established clear user priorities: - The top priorities are one stop shop and single sign on; - Summary information from other systems (e.g. Library account details shown directly in Portal) is also important; - Staff value targeted communications (portal announcements) as an effective way of getting student attention, and students would like more consistent communications usage and to be able to filter the communications they receive ; - Targeted content is of medium importance (although students often don t realise that targeting is happening); - Personalisation by the user was of low importance; - There was wide agreement that the Portal design needs to be made more modern and appealing. Assessment of possible software solutions and planning Next Generation Portal implementation: The need to align with OneIT Enterprise Architecture and the Student Education Service Programme has meant that discussions are still continuing, although initial work by the Portal Team has provided useful input in these areas. Ben Plumpton, Portal Manager, Library Page 1 of 7
3. The pilot Applicant Portal was continued, for undergraduate offer-holders in the schools of Maths and Physical Sciences. New functionality included booking onto Visit Days. 4. Most new graduates used the Graduate Portal during the first few months after graduation. 5. Student Portal changes, improvements and additions: Weekly timetable shown directly in the Portal, similar to the UniLeeds mobile app; Single-sign-on added for Leeds Network, the Volunteering Hub, and LUU election voting; A pop-up survey was provided for Law on employability; Ability to renew Library books directly from Portal; Security improvements; Updates to accommodate changes to other university systems (e.g. Library search interface changes, Alumni website changes, new route for purchasing software for home use); Changes to cope with new versions of web browsers. 6. As always, the Portal has provided effective support for university communications to students and graduates including: welcome information for new students, timely information for those about to graduate, promotion of key student surveys (NSS, UG and TPG Programme surveys, and the PRES research student survey), publicising events (e.g. for Careers and Sustainability), highlighting changes (e.g. to Online Module Enrolment this year) and supporting LUU democracy and the Partnership. Appendix 2 outlines the Portal's publicity mechanisms. User Feedback An annual feedback exercise is conducted to find out how well the Portal is meeting user needs, to identify areas where better targeting and content would be helpful, and to collect suggestions for improvements. This year over 5% of the student body responded. The percentage who assessed that the Portal performed well or very well remained high (84%), compared to the percentage who answered badly or very badly (1.5%) very similar results to the last two years. In addition to the questions about Next Generation Portal priorities (see above), other results were: Questions about mobiles were repeated to assess changes. 87% had a smartphone (76% last year), with iphone and Android equally popular and Blackberry usage declining. 58% thought the Portal worked adequately on their phone and 22% thought it worked badly. Students were asked what method they currently used to access key services (such as email, timetable, VLE, Library) and how they would prefer to access them in future. The service most frequently currently accessed through mobile apps (25%) was timetables via UniLeeds. LUU is accessed equally via the Portal and via the LUU website, and the main access route for all other services was currently via the Portal on a PC. However, students are moving towards wanting more services on their mobile devices, with around half saying they would prefer to access them in future via an app or mobile-friendly Portal. The other half would prefer to continue using these services via the Portal on a PC. As always, there were many comments about other University systems and websites, which shows that the Portal is providing a reasonably seamless environment - students don t realise these things are not actually part of the Portal. This has the unfortunate side effect that students complain about the Portal when the problem is actually elsewhere! The number who commented negatively on the Portal's look and feel has increased each year. It was anticipated that this would be addressed by the Next Generation Portal. However, given the delays explained above, it was felt necessary to respond to this feedback sooner. So the Portal Team worked on some design improvements to be launched for the start of the 2013/14 academic year, which will hopefully improve the student experience. Students suggested a range of possible additions to the Portal, although there were none with very wide support. Some of these could be added to the development wish list for the Portal, but would need to be considered in the context of planning for the Next Generation Portal. Ben Plumpton, Portal Manager, Library Page 2 of 7
Operational report System availability during the year has continued to be good (99.8%), slightly higher than last year (99%). The biggest unplanned downtime (4 hours) happened early morning on 16 th April when the database server ran out of space in its archive log. There were also several shorter outages due to problems with the Portal s internal LDAP (directory). The software vendor recommended regular (quarterly) LDAP re-indexing to prevent these problems reoccurring. Planned downtime was kept to an essential minimum, and was within the parameters agreed by BLSG previously. It included 4 afternoons (12 hours total) during February for hardware migration and several LDAP re-indexes (20 minutes each). Failovers were tested and worked correctly. On-call cover during long university closure periods continues to be arranged where possible on a voluntary basis by ISS and Library staff. There were no problems during closure periods this year. First line support is through the IT Help Desk, whilst second and third line support is by a combination of Portal Team members and ISS staff. This year 250 Portal-related calls were handled, considerably less than last year. The team has a close working relationship with the IT Help Desk which helps to ensure timely resolution of problems and good communications to users. As always, the Portal Team has liaised extensively across the University to ensure that the Portal is used effectively to support and inform students and graduates. This has included working with the VLE team, many parts of the Student Education Service, ISS teams, Library, Leeds University Union, Leeds for Life, Marketing, Accommodation, Careers, Equalities, International Office, Sports, Catering, Sustainability, Alumni Team, and faculties and schools. The level of resourcing in the Portal team is still minimal, so there remain many deferred development, maintenance and quality assurance tasks which cannot currently be addressed. Future plans Anticipated work for the 2012/13 academic year includes: 1. Next Generation Portal continued work in conjunction with OneIT Enterprise Architecture and the Student Education Service Programme to define and plan for a new University Portal. 2. User Experience work investigate student views on the changes for 2013/14, investigate usage of the Portal via statistics, and conduct the annual Portal Feedback Exercise again next spring. This will feed into the Next Generation Portal work. 3. Business As Usual continued support and maintenance of the Student Portal, Graduate Portal, and Applicant Portal including housekeeping tasks, minor developments to improve the user experience, maintenance of existing integrations with other systems, and problem resolution. 4. Significant new integrations to two new systems expected to be rolled out over the next year: 4.1 New email and calendaring system so that current functionality can be continued; 4.2 New CRM system for access to this in its early stages while the present Portal is still running. Note: It is expected, as previously agreed since these are major developments, that these projects will provide appropriate resourcing for the Portal Team for this work. The Portal Team will continue to contribute expertise and ideas to wider University debate about other Portal-related developments such as University mobile strategy, Portal functionality for staff, identity management and authentication strategy. Links and contacts Portal login page http://portal.leeds.ac.uk and Portal Help website http://library.leeds.ac.uk/portal Portal tours for different audiences can be viewed at: http://library.leeds.ac.uk/portal-tours Contact email: portalteam@leeds.ac.uk Ben Plumpton, Portal Manager, Library Page 3 of 7
Appendix 1: Detailed statistics Concurrent users Monthly maximum number of users logged in at any time during that month: Month Maximum number Date & time maximum occurred Sep-12 2,923 24/09/2012 13:40 Oct-12 3,034 02/10/2012 13:20 Nov-12 3,157 12/11/2012 12:30 Dec-12 2,953 03/12/2012 11:40 Jan-13 3,275 21/01/2013 11:40 Feb-13 3,188 11/02/2013 12:20 Mar-13 2,943 11/03/2013 11:30 Apr-13 2,973 30/04/2013 12:20 May-13 2,888 07/05/2013 11:30 Jun-13 3,226 10/06/2013 12:10 Jul-13 2,498 01/07/2013 10:40 Aug-13 997 28/08/2013 12:10 Example graph showing concurrencies during a typical term-time weekday (Tues 5 th March 2013): pattern during year Ben Plumpton, Portal Manager, Library Page 4 of 7
Monthly total logins and unique users compared with past 3 years Month 12/13 12/13 11/12 11/12 10/11 10/11 09/10 09/10 Sep 1,177,367 40,801 1,127,772 42,882 1,066,118 39,599 922,017 38,937 Oct 1,957,895 40,161 1,970,226 41,927 1,822,682 38,832 1,644,962 37,820 Nov 1,801,343 39,010 1,937,199 40,791 1,834,510 38,269 1,698,626 36,950 Dec 985,887 37,432 1,060,176 38,611 1,194,170 36,874 1,068,938 35,289 Jan 1,557,300 36,679 1,634,783 38,221 1,588,634 35,566 1,486,673 35,226 Feb 1,461,748 35,016 1,866,509 37,154 1,634,607 35,017 1,623,285 34,342 Mar 1,232,510 34,520 1,514,004 36,649 1,846,380 34,843 1,536,743 33,779 Apr 1,420,571 35,743 1,422,378 35,743 1,007,251 33,763 1,281,250 32,726 May 1,700,542 36,821 1,702,411 36,821 1,690,528 34,515 1,619,738 32,844 Jun 868,545 35,110 869,941 35,110 941,216 33,864 771,246 31,680 Jul 786,022 35,638 787,815 35,637 697,355 33,290 703,269 31,689 Aug 655,880 36,625 634,888 35,897 645,020 35,402 635,766 33,648 2,500,000 2,000,000 1,500,000 12/13 11/12 10/11 09/10 1,000,000 500,000 Unique users by month and role 1 Month 0 Sep-12 Oct-12 Nov-12 Dec-12 Jan-13 Feb-13 Mar-13 Apr-13 May-13 Jun-13 Jul-13 Aug-13 UG TPG RPG Staff Graduate Applicant Sep-12 23,688 4,443 2,711 2,901 7,044 22 Oct-12 23,622 4,561 2,665 3,008 6,295 18 Nov-12 23,345 4,414 2,571 2,902 5,618 165 Dec-12 23,369 4,268 2,400 2,563 4,633 204 Jan-13 23,635 4,476 2,530 3,008 2,661 377 Feb-13 24,140 4,386 2,474 2,787 1,057 203 Mar-13 23,922 4,347 2,490 2,717 979 93 Apr-13 24,675 4,257 2,488 2,749 922 42 May-13 24,541 4,200 2,485 2,578 958 30 Jun-13 23,696 4,097 2,364 2,413 864 24 Jul-13 23,854 4,138 2,442 2,465 933 24 Aug-13 21,776 4,431 2,429 2,402 569 46 1 The method for analysing log data was changed slightly part way through the year to use more accurate data on roles, but the overall trends should be unaffected. Ben Plumpton, Portal Manager, Library Page 5 of 7
Appendix 2: News and publicity through the Portal The Portal is a very effective mechanism for communicating with students because: 1. They log in frequently as it is their way in to key services such as the VLE and email. 2. News and announcements are shown on the Homepage tab which all users see when they log on. Although they may then click straight through to their email or elsewhere, they cannot avoid noticing news and announcements, even if they choose not to read them in detail. 3. News and announcements can be targeted in various ways, so students see content that is relevant to them and thus less likely to be seen as University spam. screenshot of Portal in August 2013 as seen by an undergraduate student There are three major areas that are used for communications and publicity: 1. What s New is for important University news, with each item typically including some brief text, an image and links for further information. The Portal Team maintain a calendar to ensure space is reserved for key items at certain times (e.g. registration, exams) without there being too many. Items are changed regularly to maintain interest. 2. News/Events Announcements are University-related and seen by all users, who can click on a title for details. Only the most recent announcements are prominent, so these announcements are used in a just in time way, which students appreciate. 3. Personal Announcements are similar, but are targeted at particular groupings, e.g. students on specific programs/levels, particular schools or halls, international students, etc. Most teaching announcements are placed in the VLE, so VLE announcements are also shown in the Portal to help ensure students are aware of them. Staff can also use the Portal to send administrative announcements to modules, which appear in Personal Announcements. Any member of staff who needs to send announcements regularly can attend a Portal training course. Otherwise, single announcements can be sent to portalteam@leeds.ac.uk who place them. Publicity to graduates and applicants is done through liaison with the relevant services. More information about Portal news and announcements can be found in the Staff section of the Portal support website at http://library.leeds.ac.uk/portal Ben Plumpton, Portal Manager, Library Page 6 of 7
Appendix 3: Portal management and funding arrangements The Portal service is led by the Library and managed by the Portal Manager as part of the Library s Digital Library Services section. The infrastructure is provided by ISS and supported by the ISS Unix team, with first line user support through the IT Help Desk. The Student Portal is steered operationally by the Student Portal Board (SPB), which reports to the Blended Learning Steering Group (BLSG) for governance and thence to Taught Student Education Board (TSEB). The business owner is the Pro-Vice-Chancellor for Student Education. The University funds the Portal Service on an on-going basis through the Library core budget, with the ISS support costs, infrastructure and software licence costs included in the ISS core budget. An Operating Agreement is in place that sets out the responsibilities of the different bodies involved. Monthly operational meetings ensure good liaison and planning. Ben Plumpton, Portal Manager, Library Page 7 of 7