Currently a wide variety of administrative computing systems are in use on campus. The ultimate goal would be to move towards a unified, centrally supported Departmental Management System that would provide the tools to locally maintain records such as departmental and laboratory accounts, budgets, electronic forms, and personnel records. The expense in providing the physical campus network and computer hardware and software that supports information technology at UAB is substantial. But the major expense that exceeds all of the above is in providing the technical support necessary to install, maintain, and administer these systems. UAB currently operates with a computing support staff that maintains central computing services, and provides whatever user support it can, given the limited personnel resources that are available.
Many departments provide their own support staff as their individual budgets allow.
This system has resulted in a support structure where some users have excellent support services, others only adequate services, while still other users are on their own, with no local assistance whatsoever. UAB needs to continue to investigate ways of providing technological support to all personnel, including students, and needs to provide continued training to existing support staff. While it is difficult to predict the overall costs of this effort, UAB s investment in this area should result in increased productivity and efficiency, if not also in an actual reduction in overall costs. Perhaps the one goal that can go further than any other in impacting all aspects of information systems at UAB would be the establishment of a permanent centralized oversight structure that has the input from personnel representing faculty, administration, and staff. Such oversight would serve to organize the various disparate committees, departments, units, and individuals which impact the provision of these services on campus.