The National Report State K-12 and Federal Government

The National Report: State, K-12, and Federal Government CAMP: June 23 rd, 2010, 10: 45 -11: 45 Presenters: Tim Poe – Sr. Collaborative Technologist at MCNC Mike Veckenstedt, Ph. D – CTO/Deputy CIO at NC-DPI Steve Thorpe – Systems Analyst at MCNC DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC INSTRUCTION / MCNC

Agenda (A) Overview of NCTrust (Tim) (B) K-12 in NCTrust (Mike) (C) Configuration Management (Steve) DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC INSTRUCTION / MCNC Slide 2

Overview of NCTrust • Now that we have the NCREN for K 20, what are the opportunities to: • Collaborate between campuses? • Break down the silos between public universities/independents/community colleges/K-12? • Collaborate with campuses in other states and nations? DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC INSTRUCTION / MCNC Slide 3

Overview of NCTrust (cont. ) • Also, what are the opportunities to provide collective resources in our state that are: • Cheaper • Better • Faster DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC INSTRUCTION / MCNC Slide 4

Overview of NCTrust (cont. ) • And how can we provide granular access so that the right people get access to the right resources at the right time (or not)? DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC INSTRUCTION / MCNC Slide 5

Overview of NCTrust (cont. ) • The CSWG (Collaborative Services Working Group) is a part of the MCNC/NCREN Advisory Structure. Cochaired by: • CIO of the public university system (UNC GA) • CIO of the community college system (NCCCS) • CIO for state K-12 (NC DPI) • Independent representation (CIO of Elon University) DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC INSTRUCTION / MCNC Slide 6

Overview of NCTrust (cont. ) • Federated Identity Management Task Force established (Chairs Mark Scheible and Mike Veckenstedt) • Comprised of the best and brightest identity management experts in NC • Recognition that a K-20 solution needed (not just higher education) • Group determined early on to utilize In. Common, largely due to value of legal framework. DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC INSTRUCTION / MCNC Slide 7

Overview of NCTrust (cont. ) • A pilot project was created: • Two K-12 Districts (Rockingham County &, Davie County) • Three Universities (UNC-Chapel Hill, Duke University, NC State University) • Two Community Colleges (Central Piedmont CC, Wake Tech CC), • Two Other Organizations (NC DPI and MCNC) • Two primary SPs (NC LIVE and VCL) DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC INSTRUCTION / MCNC Slide 8

NCTrust is a Subset of In. Common Federation DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC INSTRUCTION / MCNC Slide 9

Overview of NCTrust (cont. ) • Pilot “ended” in May 2010. • Results published in End of Year Report available at www. mcnc. org - follow links from “Advisory & Governance. ” • Now we proceed with “growing” and managing the trust. DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC INSTRUCTION / MCNC Slide 10

Overview of NCTrust (cont. ) • Success to date do to: • Platforms (CSWG and e. Learning Commission) for K-20 collaboration. • Immense amounts of expertise and good will from all sectors of K-20. • Persistent belief in achieving a vision that relies on each organization knowing who its members are, what their roles are, and the benefits of collaboration and shared resources. DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC INSTRUCTION / MCNC Slide 11

K-12 in NCTrust • 115 School Districts with ~ 2, 500 schools • ~97 Charter Schools • ~1. 4 mill students (K 12) • 17 UNC system institutions • 58 community colleges • 36 independent colleges / universities • Plus many others DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC INSTRUCTION / MCNC Slide 12

21 st Century Learning (K-12) • K-12 moves into P-20: Schools, Colleges and Universities “converging” • Learn-And-Earn: NC program • Virtual Public Schools • Student, Teacher, Parents are all part of the student’s education • “Streamlining student account administration” DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC INSTRUCTION / MCNC Slide 13

Teacher and Staff Time Is Valuable • 2 min per student per year for account administration, focusing on Middle and High School ~ 3000 admin work days statewide(K 6 -12) • Times logins for Network, Media-Center, Lunch, Study Island, Moodle, etc. (~5) => 15, 000 work days DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC INSTRUCTION / MCNC Slide 14

Other Important Benefits of FIM • Systems- and Data Security • Decentralized Account Administration works; Centralized Administration doesn’t. • Staff joining/leaving • Parents/Guardians associated to a student • Use of other Educational Resources • Virtual Computing Lab • i. Tunes University • NC-Live DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC INSTRUCTION / MCNC Slide 15

Statewide Rollout in K-12 • Selected CIMS Project: • Computerized Instructional Management System – Teacher Tool, Testing Students Online. • Included two School Districts • Shibbolized Identity Mmt Systems. • Vendor became SP. • Pilot ended in May successfully. DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC INSTRUCTION / MCNC Slide 16

Attribute Release Policy • Lots of discussion – still unclear what the total set of released attributes will be… • Student Identifier seems to be a good one. • What about: • Age? • Grade? • Special Needs? DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC INSTRUCTION / MCNC Slide 17

Some Challenges … • Membership Management of 100+ School Districts. • Legalities, Responsibilities • Central Meta-Data Management • How do you build a business case one SP at time? • One project cannot pay for all infrastructure. • Readiness of K-12 software vendors. DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC INSTRUCTION / MCNC Slide 18

… even more Challenges • Available staff at School Districts • Technical Skills of Local School District Staff • 10 month Employees. • Maintenance of the NCTrust/Shibboleth Infrastructure DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC INSTRUCTION / MCNC Slide 19

Technical Issues Non-Trivial • Requires understanding of many layers • • • XML Web application server configuration, X 509 certificates Id. P and SP packaging OS configuration Managing software updates Network configuration, etc. • This is can be challenging, especially for smaller institutions DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC INSTRUCTION / MCNC Slide 20

Id. P Virtual Machine Appliance • MCNC developed a customizable VM for the NCTrust federation participants • Guest OS is Cent. OS • Host OS can be Windows or Linux, running Xen or VMware • Preconfigured to use NCTrust Metadata (subset of In. Common’s) • Customized for each NCTrust member • This helped a LOT! DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC INSTRUCTION / MCNC Slide 21

Configuration Management • MCNC’s Automated Configuration Management System • Rapid building and replicating of customized OS installs • Automated deployment of patching and reconfigurations • Delta among Id. Ps is small • Only ~15 small files are different, totaling just ~150 KB • Rest of the appliance is same for all DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC INSTRUCTION / MCNC Slide 22

Id. P Appliance Only Goes So Far • Each institution is unique • Back-end Identity Infrastructure • Technical Skill Set • Considerable ramp-up effort is still required at each organization • Centralized NCTrust Federation Id. P Hosting? • NCTrust is looking at options for this • Probably this is much more scalable for NC’s K-12 community DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC INSTRUCTION / MCNC Slide 23

Conclusions • It works…, even in K-12! • How can we finalize an Attribute Release policy for K-12 / P-20? • Skill set requirements are challenging. • More vendors have to become SPs • Scaling requires • New organizational thinking • Cloud-like computing DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC INSTRUCTION / MCNC Slide 24

Thank You Also thanks to the many Federated ID Task Force members from throughout the NCREN community that are participating with us in the NCTrust pilot project More Info: Link: http: //edspace. mcnc. org/confluence/display/FIM Tim Poe: tpoe@mcnc. org Mike Veckenstedt: mveckenstedt@dpi. state. nc. us Steve Thorpe: thorpe@mcnc. org DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC INSTRUCTION / MCNC Slide 25

See you in the Federation