IT Strategic Plan | 58 HISTORY OF INFORMATIONTECHNOLOGY @ UK UK has successfully leveraged IT resources over the past 15 years to enable modernization of administrative applications, including services to students, faculty, and staff. It has moved from a University-based technology infrastructure to a customer-based infrastructure focused on encouraging access to knowledge locally and world-wide. Continued focus on support for students, faculty, and staff has brought many advancements and efficiencies to the University. Great improvements in networking infrastructure have served to improve access for all members of the University community, allowing customers to use personal devices to access information at any time, from anywhere. Research computing has continued to evolve into an infrastructure that supports the evolving technology requirements of the faculty at UK, by moving from using local HPC resources to utilizing research facilities at national research laboratories. ITS provides the infrastructure and tools to maintain a robust and stable technology infrastructure that is continually evolving into the environment required to enhance the student, faculty, and staff experience. In 2003, the University began to replace aging, highly customized administrative applications. Within 15-months of the project’s inception, financials, student accounting, and materials management were implemented. Human resources, financial aid, student lifecycle management, and plant maintenance followed in the next year. With the implementation of an imaging solution, both student records and human resources were able to provide broader access to information that had been only paper-based, freeing much-needed storage. A mobile application was developed to allow students to review their classes, register for classes, view their grades, and pay their bills online. Additionally, applications were built for mobile devices to support student advising, bringing together information from different locations to improve the experience for both the student and the advisor. As a part of the system replacement initiative, a reporting infrastructure was created with ease of use as the primary driver. Today, UK is the leader in delivering real-time data to those individuals who need it. The focus on access to data has provided great benefits to the University community. This environment will continue to grow and improve as data needs are uncovered. The University delivered statewide leadership in introducing technology to support students. What was then UK Information Technology (UKIT) instituted the student technology fee (STF) in 1992, to provide dependable funding forcurrentandfuturetechnologiesthatwouldservetheacademicneedsofourstudentbody.Inaddition, the University instituted a distance learning fee (DLF) to encourage the development of online courses and tele- courses in which the majority of instruction occurs when students and instructors are not in the same place. The MediaDepothasbeenahighlysuccessfulendeavorthatwasrequestedbystudentsandfundedbytheSTF.Thislab provides opportunities for students to create multimedia presentations for their classes as well as provide a space for them to explore their creativity. By focusing on technology students need both for course work and to prepare them for their careers after college, the requirements for more innovative technology and support continually evolve. Additionally, the STF provides students with access to the latest collaboration resources available from companies such as Microsoft and Google. DLF funds are used to support the enhancement of the technology used for courses designated as distance learning, including interactive technology classrooms used to deliver courses across the Commonwealth, and to support the development and updating of distance learning courses.