By Jocelyne LaFortune, Staff Writer -- lafortun12@up.edu
What annoys you most about the UP online portal?
What new features would make your life easier?
The University is beginning a nine-month campaign to improve PilotsUP, the online portal for students, faculty and staff. Students are invited to give their input and suggestions to help make the portal more relevant to them.
"We want to improve the ease and accessibility of information of the portal," Director of Web and Administrative Systems Jenny Walsh said. "The portal should make it easier to do what you need to do."
The first step toward improving the portal is gathering information from students, faculty and staff about specific improvements that should be made, according to Walsh.
Possible improvements include online project collaboration spaces, real-time online chat and increased customization of one's own personal portal view, according to Walsh.
"We're calling this semester our ‘spring sponge,'" Walsh said. "We have some ideas for improvements, but in order to make sure it works for our school specifically, we need some feedback."
Walsh has planned a series of five "town hall" style meetings, during which students and staff can drop in and give suggestions.
The first meeting was Tuesday. Only one student attended, but suggestions from faculty and staff at the meeting included streamlining the login process to a single time login.
Dates and times of future meetings are posted on the PilotsUP – Ahead blog on the portal, and Walsh encourages students to attend or post suggestions on the blog. She is also posting tweets about the project on a new Twitter account: @pilotsUPahead.
"If we don't hear from students and staff, we won't know what should be improved," Walsh said.
Walsh hopes to have the basic portal in place by the upcoming fall semester, but the portal will continue to be updated and adapted to the university's needs, she said.
