Build a Transformational Network and Systems

Salesforce Education Cloud: The ITS Enterprise Salesforce Org service upgraded to a new Salesforce platform called Education Cloud. The platform architecture has features designed for an Education base, and we are Education! The goal is to use the innovative features Salesforce has delivered in Education Cloud and move away from custom development.
Implemented a number of DART enhancements including:
- Updates to recognition credits and adding new special recognition credit attributes to improve data integrity and reporting accuracy.
- Introducing a new method for processing online payment transactions, directly supporting the Office of University Development’s goal of enhancing the donor digital experience.
- Improving tribute management functionality, making it easier for users to manage and acknowledge tribute gifts within the system.

Human Capital Management

Remote Worker Integration in PeopleSoft: Automated the process for remote work agreements within M-Pathways, facilitating seamless collection and approval through self-service workflows. This also provides university-wide data on employee locations.
Earned Sick Time Act (ESTA) Project: Executed a complex rollout to align with legislative changes and university leave practices.

Supply Chain and Financial Operations

LIMITS Implementation: Rolled out in all U-M Hospital Operating Rooms, further enhancing U-M’s supply chain management through advanced enterprise tools.
Check Printing: Outsourced this function to streamline operations and optimize resource use.
Worldpay Merchant Exceptions: Developed a specialized process for handling exceptions, increasing financial flexibility.
Chrome River (Emburse Enterprise) Expense Management: Supported the implementation of a new expense management tool, responding to the demand for better integration with new travel systems and improved user experience.

Student Administration Enhancements

Official Transcripts Ordering: Alumni can now order transcripts online without needing U-M login credentials, removing the hassle of paper forms. Students benefit as well, with the ability to send transcripts electronically to services like LSAC and NursingCAS, ensuring quicker delivery and a smoother process. These enhancements have led to a 70% drop in transcript-related TeamDynamix emails and a 30% decline in phone inquiries, significantly easing our department's workload. Additionally, individuals who graduated before fall 1993 can now receive PDF transcripts, further reducing paper mailings. Those who have used the service have expressed appreciation for the faster and more convenient electronic options.
Admissions Prospective Student Record Cleanup: Reconciled more than 200,000 prospect records, thereby improving system performance and reducing personal data access, aligning with data protection principles.
SPACES (SPecialized Academic Classroom & Event Scheduling) Implementation: Implemented new system supporting over 12,000 class sections and 11,000 events, ensuring efficient resource allocation and scheduling.

Research Administration Advancements

Framework Upgrades: Upgraded two critical systems to support enhanced research capabilities.
AI for Awards: Conceived and implemented AI application for award processing, reducing direct data entry and related staff time for ORSP.
eResearch Replacement Systems Recommendation Project: The current eResearch platform is being phased out by the vendor by 2031. In the planning phase we are exploring various strategic options to develop a roadmap that allows for a smooth transition with minimal disruption.

Strategic Collaborations and Initiatives

ITS Emerging Technology

Disaster Recovery: Continued emphasis on developing robust disaster recovery protocols.
AI: Achieved a 100% completion rate across EAS in the AI 8-week Challenge and created an EAS AI Champions program, fostering an innovation-driven culture.
Professional Development Engagement: Conducted a survey to align professional growth initiatives with staff interests and organizational needs.

Maizey and Canvas: the Perfect Match

As generative artificial intelligence became more integrated with campus life in FY2025, we saw instructors and students engage with U-M's tools more than ever. The U-M Maizey LTI Connector was used to create over 500 AI tutors, accessible around-the-clock, with access to course materials provided in Canvas.

The LTI Connector turns a few clicks by an instructor into a virtual teaching assistant with access to lecture slides, recordings, and more. Approximately 5,500 students engaged with course-custom Maizeys to ask questions, create study guides, and more deeply understand the material outside the classroom and office hours.

Maizeys created using the U-M Maizey LTI Connector are even accessible to students through Go Blue. When the student signs in to the app, the Maizeys created in Canvas are automatically connected so they can even study on the go!

More Engagement Than Ever

ITS Emerging Technology

FY2025 saw an increase in the number of wolverines engaging with U-M's AI services. The total number of users of U-M GPT surpassed 43,800, increasing by over 30%, and over 5,800 unique Maizey projects were created. These numbers are not only a testament to AI’s increasing popularity but to the 12 releases of new tools and features made by the Emerging Technology team. With each release, improvements to the functionality of U-M GPT, Maizey, and Go Blue made engaging with U-M's custom AI tools more effective and accessible for everyone on campus.

U-M GPT used 102,319,599,639 tokens, which is equal to about 76.7 billion words — that’s enough words to repeat Taylor Swift’s discography over 900,000 times (vault tracks included), fill enough sheets of paper with 12pt font, when laid end to end, to circumnavigate the globe with 2,000 miles to spare, or over 1.5 million copies of the Dune and Wicked screenplays combined — talk about holding space, it’s time to call ARC for an increase in storage!

Continuing to Enhance Privacy at U-M

The ITS Office of Privacy and the Office of the Vice President for Communications (OVPC) released a new consent and preference management integration for U-M websites that accommodates the university’s complex, decentralized web environment and allows for easy integration and the ability to support non-umich.edu domains. The solution meets compliance requirements and demonstrates the university’s commitment to protecting the privacy of its community members and visitors.

In FY25, the Office of Privacy remained focused on broad outreach and education. Many U-M community members and guests attended this year’s Data Privacy Day keynote event on January 28, 2025, which featured a presentation by Prof. Sauvik Das on ‘Privacy in the Age of AI,’ and an in-depth conversation with UMSI Prof. Florian Schaub.

Following the success of ViziBLUE, the Office of Privacy debuted another innovative privacy tool this year. Privacy Portraits is a question-based, fun way to find out what sort of privacy persona you are and to learn about best practices selected just for you.

Supporting a Credible, Implementable, Enforceable, and Sustainable IT Policy Environment

The team also developed a new self-service tool to help faculty and staff classify the data they are working with against the U-M data classification levels. This tool provides non-dispositive guidance to help plan for working with and protecting sensitive data.

Standardizing Campus Security and Vulnerability Management with CrowdStrike and Tenable

As part of an initiative to reduce security risks to university systems, ITS Information Assurance (IA) replaced the Center for Internet Security (CIS) hardening tool with features offered by the already deployed capabilities built into the CrowdStrike Configuration Management Tool and Tenable. Removing manual CIS steps allows greater machine coverage and faster ongoing secure configuration checks against known baselines. This makes it easier for campus units to identify misconfigurations in their systems.

IA scans campus networks for vulnerabilities monthly, and units can choose to perform scans more often. A few times a year, IA audits for extremely critical vulnerabilities that have not been patched and are currently being exploited. Units with these vulnerabilities are given one month to patch their machines, or IA will quarantine their machine using CrowdStrike.

IA has also made a Web App Scanning feature from Tenable available to units as a self-service tool. Web App scanning allows a web application to be scanned to identify coding issues that may result in security concerns. By making this self-serve, units can scan their homegrown web apps at any time, for example, before they deploy new code changes to production.

Additionally, IA partnered with the central ITS Cloud team to deploy Tenable Cloud Security as its primary tool for monitoring cloud systems like AWS, Azure, and GCP, helping to spot and fix problems quickly. Tenable complements CrowdStrike Falcon, and with the addition of the Falcon Complete service, gives U-M and our partners at CrowdStrike the ability to detect and quickly respond to threats to our IT systems and data. Together, the two systems give U-M exceptional proactive, prevention, and response capabilities, and provide unit IT staff with access to information they can use to protect their unit and U-M.

Strengthening Cybersecurity Preparedness with Collaboration and Integration

In FY25, ITS Information Assurance (IA) created a tool to use Michigan Intelligence for Threat Negation (MITN) security data with Cloudflare, a market leader in the website Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) protection space. This helps the MITN repository better manage web security and reduce false alarms.

Network and Connectivity Enhancements

Enhanced 5G Connectivity: The university worked with mobile providers to significantly boost the capacity and speed of 5G service, enhancing smartphone communication across campus. This initiative included upgrades at Michigan Stadium, providing faster data speeds and more reliable calls during events.
Comprehensive Campus and Off-Campus U-M Net Upgrades: The team migrated to a new backbone network architecture across 69 buildings, and also greatly increasing WiFi coverage and capacity. Off-campus, they introduced U-M Net Hotspot to deliver robust internet access in areas lacking traditional infrastructure.
Enhanced Security and Network Expansions: The team installed new firewalls across several university buildings to improve network security. They also expanded the fiber optic network and streamlined the approval process for network extensions. 79 Distribution Layers and 958 Access Layer switches were upgraded in Ann Arbor, ensuring over half of the 216 buildings on campus now have at least 100 gigabit per second network connectivity. Buildings were prioritized based on imminent research needs, known bandwidth bottlenecks, and the end-of-life date of the existing network switches.

Communication System Upgrades

Modernized Phone System: The ITS Infrastructure team transitioned Flint and Dearborn campuses to Zoom Phone, replacing outdated systems to enhance call quality and reduce costs. This modernization improved communication efficiency for faculty, staff, and students.
Upgraded Call Centers: The team upgraded university call centers to Amazon Connect, leveraging modern, scalable technology to improve customer service. This transition enabled quicker response times and personalized interactions, enhancing user experience.

Safety and Reliability Improvements

Emergency Phone Restorations: The team restored emergency phones to good working order, ensuring these critical devices remain operational to maintain campus safety and compliance. These phones serve as vital lifelines for communication during emergencies.
Power Infrastructure: The team conducted preventive maintenance on the MACC Generator Electrical Switchgear to ensure uninterrupted power reliability for critical facilities. They migrated networks to a new core infrastructure, reinforcing the reliability of essential university operations.

Audio-Visual and Technology Upgrades

Expanded AV Options: The ITS team installed advanced Zoom Room-based AV systems in key university locations, enabling features like voice amplification and lecture capture. These installations offer a flexible and economical alternative to high-cost AV systems, enhancing classroom and conference room capabilities.

Empowering Users with Superior Software

In collaboration with Service Support, initiated the transition of UmichITAM SharePoint content to TeamDynamix (TDX) Assets, aligning with ITS ecosystem enhancements. This was capped by securing comprehensive site licenses, including Endnote and Overleaf, to meet compliance and operational requirements efficiently.

Tech Repair: Leadership in Campus Repair Services

Tech Repair cemented its position as the leading Apple Authorized Service Provider in higher education, handling unparalleled repair volumes due. Thanks in large to our team of highly trained technicians, Tech Repair reduced downtime at competitive prices. New status communication tools, utilizing a dynamic progress bar, have streamlined repair updates and improved customer interactions.

Advanced Tools for User Support and Service Optimization

The Tech Help team facilitated 1,250 laptop loans via the Sites @ Home program and processed over 12,000 MCard transactions. By adopting dedicated asset management within TDX, Tech Help has improved efficiency and user experiences through automation.

TDX expanded further by onboarding nine groups to individual TDX applications and adding three to Campus Tickets, now boasting over 75 active user groups and processing more than 3,700 ticket transfers, including collaborations with Michigan Medicine.

Collaboration Services championed lifecycle improvements in Google Workspace by instituting annual renewal processes for shared drives and accounts. New self-service tools considerably reduced collaborators’ ticket workload by 25%, enhancing service efficiency.

Enhanced Campus Digital Accessibility Offerings and Services

Two key tools designed to enhance digital accessibility launched this year: Grackle and Panorama. Grackle, an add-on for Google Docs, Slides, and Sheets, empowers users to improve content accessibility for students and colleagues. Panorama, integrated into Canvas, offers data dashboards on course content accessibility, along with instructor tools for content creation and remediation and student tools for generating alternate formats. These tools significantly advance the accessibility of educational and work materials, supporting compliance with accessibility standards.

MiWorkspace: Future-Proofing Computing Infrastructure