Student Affairs Communications Group Minutes
May 15, 2013
Attendance: Kami Hammerschmith, Kent Sumner, Wendy Little, Jen Still, Megan
Full, Nancy Raskauskas, Jennifer Gossett
Next meeting of the Student Affairs Communications Group will be Wednesday, May
29, 2013, 9 a.m.-10:30 a.m., MU Council Room. Topic: Melody Oldfield and Steve
Clark will talk about IMC Tactics.
Today
Kent asked about meeting times. Currently we are opposite the Student Affairs
Assessment Council meetings on Wednesdays, 9 a.m. – 10:30 a.m. They have
published their meetings for 2013-14, so Kent wants to get our dates scheduled. For
the summer it was suggested we meet once a month. Suggested topics included a
meeting to work on/share marketing/communication plans; metrics and tracking of
design work and determining effectiveness; and future conferences and trainings
members will be attending next year.
Kent spoke with Larry Roper about the new Student Affairs communications
position, co-funded by Student Affairs and University Relations and Marketing
(URM). Kent asked if it is a Student Affairs position that works with URM or a URM
position dedicated to Student Affairs. Larry said he and Steve Clark had not had that
discussion. Larry would like our group to do some legwork on the position
description, reporting structure and office location. It was suggested a sub-group of
the Student Affairs Communications Group work on these details and then report
back to the large group for feedback. Larry would like to have this position in place
for next year, so the timeline is tight. This position will tell the story of Student
Affairs and support all of us, and the work we do. This person will also lead the
Student Affairs Communications Group that would become a Council and have a
formal charge. This could involve coordination of Student Affairs
marketing/communication plans, similar to the way the Student Affairs Assessment
Council coordinates assessment plans.
Kami announced that Student Media has hired a new Creative Services Coordinator.
Don Boucher will start on Thursday, May 23. Student Media uses Extensis Portfolio
8.5 as its content management system for ads, artwork, photos, etc.
Nancy and Megan presented their UHDS Graphic Design Request. It is an online form
that once filled out sends an e-mail to Natalie Moser, Jennifer Viña, Nancy and
Megan. They also presented on Basecamp, a cloud-based project management
system they use. URM also uses it.
Megan said it costs about $1,000/year. The cost is based on your storage limit as it
stores your source files. Once a project is complete you can archive it. The system
then locks it and no longer counts it against your storage space.
In Basecamp you can setup your company – any employee you want to give access.
Access can be given per project or all files. It creates a Dashboard for all active
projects with a calendar that shows your milestone dates. Each individual project
also has its own Dashboard. Megan said they are working on naming conventions
for their archived projects.
Megan and Nancy like Basecamp because everything is in one place for everyone to
see, it keeps files out of individual folders and it can work remotely, you can login
from anywhere. They said it is hard because you must login to use it, it’s an extra
work piece and you have to keep it cleaned up/up-to-date.
Nancy said for freelance work she does, she uses Google Drive to share work with
clients and work on projects in tandem. She also uses Dropbox. Its only drawback is
if you hit a file size limit.
Wendy shared Recreational Sports Graphic Design Request Form. It is a Word
document. Rec Sports has program-planning meetings at the beginning of each term.
Wendy takes the information and creates a promotion plan, broken down week-byweek. They are using Wunderlist, a free program, to manage design workflow. Each
designer has his/her own list of projects. They do not store files in the program.
They have separate shared folders – a design request folder with sub-folders for
each designer where current projects are kept and completed projects folders for
each area of Rec Sports to drag the project to when they are completed.
Rec Sports has created a new file organizing system and a new file naming system.
Kent shared the new online work order he designed for the MU Graphic Design
Studio. It is a Drupal form. Under the possible deliverables he added an estimated
cost.
Wendy suggested this group try to all have the same graphic request order form, so
it is standardized for the Division. It was also suggested we have a standardized
photo request form. We also discussed updating the list of what our departments
offer in regards to TV screens, online banners, table tents, etc., and what the
dimensions are for each. These forms could then be added to the Student Affairs
Communications Group website.