Kaley Patterson
A&E Editor
@KaleyKayPatt
Everyday there are new technical issues emerging on campus. Whether it’s concerning faculty, staff or students, the CU Information Technology Services are the ones who try to meet the needs.
If the problem concerns Wi-Fi connection, password resets or Blackboard, all problems are directed to the ITS Help Desk. Student Help Desk Manager Margot Gregory deals with student-related issues.
“At the very beginning of the semester the call volume is very, very high,” Gregory said, “but I speak to about 25 students a day once the beginning of the semester slows down. Usually those type of calls pertain to password resets.”
Since 2012, students are required to change their password to Aggie Access every 120 days, which then changes their password to get on campus computers and to access their Gmail accounts. This system is for privacy protection.
“It’s not that they forget their password,” Gregory said. “It’s that they don’t keep track of their email, so they miss their password reset deadlines. Then their account gets locked.”
During 2014 Gregory received 8,864 support inquires from the student help desk side of the ITS Support Desk. Gregory said students who have problems with passwords, Blackboard, Wi-Fi or anything regarding their account are supposed to get in touch with her directly.
“If the student emails support@cameron.edu,” Gregory said, “it goes into [the faculty help desk] queue and gets routed to me. It can stay in the queue for a day or two before it actually gets to me.”
Assistant Director of ITS Greg Duncan explained there are many systems a request has to go through before someone at the support desk can start working on the problem. Aggies can call the ITS Support Desk or email them to submit a support request.
“They have a track-it system. It’s a software for help desks,” Duncan said. “They’ll get that ticket in and create it based on the call or based on the email. It’ll automatically create it if it’s an email. They’ll assign a technician to it, or whoever is responsible for whatever issue they’re encountering, and then they’ll start working on that issue. It’ll be in their queue.”
The queue is then labeled based on need by the support desk priority system. On Jan. 30, Help Desk Coordinator Greg Davies sent an email to faculty and staff explaining the priority system due to the recent questions from staff members about how it works. A graphic of the priority system is included below this article.
In the email, Davies said, “These guidelines are based upon what we believe to be significant needs through lesser requests. For example, a person who is unable to power up their PC will most likely receive a higher priority than someone who is requesting assistance with their iPhone.”
In 2014, the support desk received 5,211 tickets for faculty/staff. Duncan said there are a lot of demands put on the help desk and in turn, the desk sees a high turn over rate.
Aggies have complained about the support desk as being insufficient and untimely. Duncan said this depends on how the help desk is being contacted.
“A lot of people don’t know who to call,” Duncan said. “We’re trying to push for everyone to send their issues to support@cameron.edu because one thing that does is it … automatically creates a ticket. So it’ll automatically end up in the support queue and people will see it first thing in the morning.
“If you call, it may end up on somebody’s phone and they may not check their voicemail. Who knows? Or they may call the wrong person, and the wrong person deletes it and goes on. So the best thing is to email support. “
