Families who are home with their students right now may be looking for character development opportunities. The Ray Center has a series of Family Guides for Teaching Good Character available on our website.

— Amy Smit, Robert D. & Billie Ray Center

When a piece of technology quickly grows in popularity, it’s a given that the number of threat actors taking advantage of new and untrained users will also grow. The world is seeing this now with video conferencing tools, especially the popular and free Zoom.

With multiple reports of calls being interrupted with pornographic, violent, or racial images and threatening language, the FBI has issued a warning for users of video conferencing platforms about the issue. Techniques to discover meeting IDs for Zoom meetings have been circulating for nearly a year, but have seen a large spike in usage.

The good news is that most video conferencing and remote collaboration tools include settings that can prevent these events from occurring. ITS has additional resources to learn about the best collaboration tools for your situation, including best-practice guides and live training.

Here are some tips to ensure a good experience.

• Don’t use consumer-grade software or subscription plans. Consumer tools and subscriptions do not have the administrative tools needed to limit access. While no solution can guarantee security, enterprise-grade tools like Blackboard Collaborate or Microsoft Teams offer a more complete set of controls.
• Do use waiting room features. These features place participants in a separate room before the meeting and allow the host to admit only the people who are supposed to be there.
• Don’t share links to meetings or classes via social media. Invite the attendees via email or from the collaboration software.
• Do use the latest software version. Security vulnerabilities are likely to be exploited more often in older versions. For example, Zoom recently updated its software to require password-protected meetings, and is rolling out more features in the coming months. Double-check that participants are using the latest version available.
• Don’t use video on a call until you need to. Turning off your webcam and muting your microphone when you’re not speaking prevents social engineering efforts to learn more about you, and saves network bandwidth, improving the quality of the meeting.
• Do eject participants if an intruder gets in or becomes unruly. Ejecting a participant prevents them from rejoining.

While scams and phishing related to working from home and COVID-19 are more prevalent than ever, collaboration and meetings are being hit especially hard. ITS will continue to simulate phishing and assign training to those most susceptible. If you believe you’ve been targeted by phishing, see Reporting a Phishing Message (How-to).

— Peter Lundstedt, ITS

Due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, the University has extended its travel suspension policy through at least May 31, 2020. The policy states: Any travel outside of the state of Iowa on behalf of the University is suspended, unless deemed critical and approved by the senior administrator in your area. The suspension applies to all University-sponsored travel, including international, academic, athletic, conferences and workshops, and research-related travel. If you are seeking an exception to this policy, please work through your direct supervisor, who will escalate the request to senior administration.

For the latest updates, please visit drake.edu/coronavirus. 

Microsoft Teams is a tool that ITS has been rolling out at Drake for file sharing, communication, and collaboration. Since we’ve started working and teaching at a distance, people want to learn how to use Teams more effectively, especially for virtual communication.

Come to this virtual session to learn about holding meetings in Microsoft Teams, how to better communicate with your colleagues at a distance, and ask ITS staff questions you may have about using Teams.

Follow the link below each date at the time listed to join. You’ll need to join using the Teams desktop app, the mobile app, or on a computer using a Chrome or Edge browser.

Wednesday, April 1, from 11 a.m.–12 p.m. Join meeting.

Thursday, April 2, from 3–4 p.m. Join meeting.

Friday, April 3, from 10–11 a.m. Join meeting.

Can’t make it? More information is available in our guide at Holding Virtual Meetings Using Microsoft Teams (Best Practices).

— Carla Herling, ITS

Thank you for your patience as we all work to get better at remote teaching and learning practices.

To help you keep learning how to best support students at a distance, our Academic and Emerging Technology (AET) team will be holding additional sessions to support your needs for teaching and learning remotely.

Assessing Student Learning with Multiple Options
Wednesday, April 1, at 10 a.m. via Blackboard Collaborate

Blackboard Learn has many tools available to assess student learning. As you identify how you want to assess student learning on any given learning objective, we can help you identify what tools match your assessment goals. This session will cover assignments, tests, surveys, and other gradable interactions among students, and between students and instructors.

Remote Presentations and Breakout Groups in Collaborate Ultra
Thursday, April 2, at 10 a.m. via Blackboard Collaborate

Many classes are upholding the requirements listed on their syllabi to include individual or group presentations while participating in remote teaching and learning. We will provide you with options of how you can support your learning objectives to complete remote presentations or have your students work in breakout groups during live sessions.

NOTE: If some or any of the work can be done in an asynchronous manner, we still recommend that approach. Live sessions are complicated and involve an additional learning curve. We hope to help lessen that learning curve by providing some better practices and approaches.

A few other suggestions:

• Please be mindful that students have other commitments during these changing times and we need to have conversations with the students before changing requirements. Please consult with your students about their availability before switching schedules.
• Remote learning does not equal best practices in distance or online learning. Many universities have had this discussion and all agree that remote learning is a way to conduct what were once face-to-face courses in a different format and yet not be held to the same standards as distance or online learning programs. This is an important distinction to make.

We are working with the best tools we have available to make the best of a situation. This does not mean that you are now conducting a program that must meet distance or online learning standards. Please continue to do the best with what you have, but understand that reality is a changing landscape and our learning environment will continue to need to be fluid in its delivery model.

— Academic and Emerging Technology (AET) Team, ITS

The deadline for submitting Fall 2020 course material adoptions is April 15. The University Bookstore has a simple tool for you to use this adoption season: Follett Discover.

Adopting on time contributes to course materials affordability. By submitting adoptions prior to the due date or by the due date, your campus store has time to source used and rental inventory, which translates to savings for your students. If you consistently use the same book from term to term, partner with the campus store to let them know because this will translate into even larger savings for your students.

Another important aspect that relies on timely textbook adoption is compliance to the Higher Education Opportunity Act (HEOA), which is aimed at making college more affordable and accessible by calling for full disclosure and transparency related to the selection, pricing, and use of course materials when registration for courses begins. HEOA was enacted into federal law in 2010. At Drake University, the Bookstore is the collection agent for textbook adoptions, posting the adoptions submitted and thus ensuring the University’s compliance to the HEOA.

Follett Discover allows you to easily discover, research, and adopt course materials all in one place. In addition to adopting traditional print materials, Follett Discover makes it easy to search and adopt non-traditional materials such as YouTube videos, open education resources, and MOOC content.

Easy steps to access Follett Discover through Blackboard

1. Log into myDrake.
2. Find the Tools channel, scroll down and click the Follett Discover link OR find the Follett Discover channel, and click the Launch Discover link.

For questions about the tool or how it works, contact the Bookstore.

—  Donna Hallstrom, University Bookstore

On Oct. 1, Microsoft will be decommissioning Basic Authentication, an older back-end protocol that allows us to log into email applications, in favor of a more secure method called Modern Authentication.

Modern Authentication is already built-in and enabled in newer versions of Outlook, but there are many other email clients that are incompatible, which will cause them to stop working when Basic Authentication is disabled on Oct. 1, 2020.

Over the next few months, ITS will be installing compatible versions of Outlook on all Drake-owned computers missing this software. If you are using Outlook 2016 or newer on a Drake-owned computer, no action is required.

If you use an older version of Outlook or a third-party email client to access your Drake email account from a Drake-owned computer, personal computer, or mobile device, you have a few options to ensure your access is not interrupted on Oct. 1:

1. Switch to Outlook on the Web. Outlook on the Web is available through myDrake at the My Email link. No software installation or changes are required with this option.
2. Switch to Outlook 2016 or newer. If you are using a third-party mail program, your mail may not be able to be migrated into Outlook.
3. Verify whether your third-party email program or app will work with Modern Authentication. Many email software publishers are updating their software to ensure continued compatibility, but check to make sure yours will work.

The following third-party desktop and mobile apps are currently known to be compatible with Modern Authentication:

• The native Mail app for iOS 11.x and newer
• Apple Mail on MacOS 10.15 and newer
• Outlook 2016 and newer
• Outlook for iOS and Android

For additional information, see Preparing for Modern Authentication (How-to).

Microsoft Outlook is the only mail and calendar application supported by Drake—all other apps are not guaranteed to work and are not supported by ITS.

As the Oct. 1 cut-off date approaches, ITS will send additional communications to those affected to ensure email access is not interrupted.

If you have any questions or need assistance with changing email clients on a Drake-owned computer, please visit the ITS Service Portal at https://service.drake.edu/its.

—Peter Lundstedt, ITS

Due to the campus transition from the impacts of COVID-19 and timing issues with the survey provider, the Great Colleges to Work For Survey will be postponed until the fall. If you have any questions, please contact Mary Alice Hill or Nate Reagen.

— Nate Reagen, President’s Office