Project Definition
The eduroam Connection App project sets out to improve the student experience in relation to students' and staff ability to successfully connect to the eduroam wireless service.
Background
One of the main priorities of every new student arriving at the University of Edinburgh is to successfully connect to the Wi-Fi network. However, from first-hand experience running the Main Library's Get Connected sessions this year during Welcome Week and Week 1 this is far from a simple process for new students to achieve. From 1996 quick unidesk calls recorded at the desk 1322 were related to getting connected to eduroam (66%). The large majority of these issues were user error/configuration and not device related.
Further evidence that supports the idea of that students experience difficulties connecting to eduroam was highlighted near the end of the previous academic year (March-May 2017) during the operation of the IT Support desk in the Main Library. At that time the pilot IT support desk service recorded that 27% of all enquiries resolved were eduroam related issues; a surprisingly high number that late in the academic year.
As a result, this project has been approved as innovation fund project with the objective to help improve the successful rate of connection to eduroam thus resulting in improving the student experience. The project has been allocated a budget of £5000 and is required to be completed in time for the new student intake (September 2018).
Project objectives
- A large percentage of the project work to be completed using Students IT Assistants from the IT Support Desk.
Benefit: This is a wonderful opportunity to highlight the benefits of student employment and a case study of students involved throughout the whole project cycle: from identification of the issue to resolution, benefiting not only the students who work on this project by providing them real world experience in project resolution but also producing a solution for eduroam connectivity that will positively impact the whole university community.
- To scope out best practice with regards to connecting to eduroam at other institutions.
Benefit: eduroam is a service that used across higher education institutions (HEIs) worldwide. So the assumption is that if we are experiencing issues, these issues may have already been experienced and resolved at other institutions. Discovering how other institutions cope with the same issue will allow us to choose the right solution for us.
- Implement a solution based on the research stage for example: Developing an in-house University of Edinburgh eduroam connection app or third party app in time for the new student intake September 2018.
Benefit: Ideally we would like to take out as much user configuration and error out of the connection process as possible.
The full Project Initiation Document which sets out the business case, objectives and plan for the project going forward can be found here: http://edin.ac/2E2TPnK
Current project status
| Report Date | RAG | Budget | Effort Completed | Effort to complete |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| September 2018 | BLUE | 0.0 days | 0.0 days | 0.0 |