Gregg Eldred

Google Apps for Education will be the new university- wide collaboration service, as announced by President Samuel L. Stanley, Jr. in his email on Dec.19. This is a result of the suggestion from the Steering Committee, whose investigation considered issues including but not limited to security, accessibility, and usability.

. . . Lotus Notes was the former program used for most of these functions. But as co-chair of the Steering Committee Margaret Schedel said, “Lotus Notes was awkward.”

The switch from the lotus notes and MySBMail to Google’s services was not necessarily due to problems with the former system. “Lotus Notes and MySBmail work reliably well; as with any system, users have expressed dissatisfaction with certain features and functionality — that these systems didn’t seem to be keeping up with new developments and modes of use,” said Chris Kielt, Schedel’s co-chair, and Chief Information Officer. “Google Apps for Education will bring immediate and ongoing improvements.”