Category: Services

Feedback invited on catering and amenity offer on South Kensington Campus

Feasibility study reviewing space on Level 0 Sherfield Building including Holland Club

Staff and students are invited to offer input to a feasibility study, which will consider how the space on Level 0 at the western end of the Sherfield Building could be optimised to provide social facilities and amenities to members of the Imperial College community.

Portfolio Review Board (PRB) took this decision in order to address a growing concern over our ability to deliver a good experience on campus for all staff and students.   Alongside outstanding facilities for academic activities, the College aims to provide high-quality services and social spaces to meet the needs of the community, for example common rooms and catering outlets.   On the South Kensington Campus, these have reached saturation point.   In 2010-11, the College provided catering services to a footfall of 2.5 million and was still unable to meet demand.   Student feedback has also highlighted that taught postgraduates would welcome more appropriate common room provision on campus.

The feasibility study will explore how the space on Level 0 of Sherfield could be used to help address the issues above.   The study will include a review of the space currently occupied by the Holland Club, which has a floor area comparable to that of the Senior Common Room, and will consider:

–       what additional catering and amenities would best serve the needs of staff and students on the South Kensington Campus;

–       whether any new facilities should be open to all members of the community or to just a segment;

–       how the ethos of the Holland Club might be maintained within any new facilities.

The feasibility study will be led by the Director of Commercial Services, Jane Neary, working with Building Projects.

To offer input, please email catering.projects@imperial.ac.uk or post a comment below.

The Portfolio Review Board will review the results in Q2 2012 and determine next steps for the project.

Carbon Management Strategy

The Management Board considered a paper by Facilities Management, which outlined successes and challenges for the College’s carbon management strategy.

The successes noted include the ‘hit the button’ campaign, encouraging staff to switch off their computers when not in use, and the Student Switch Off initiative which promotes sustainable behaviour among students in halls of residence. The paper also reported the positive results of trials to reduce the energy usage of buildings, which have included reviewing and optimising the operation of central heating, ventilation and air conditioning systems.

Challenges faced include the difficulty in progressing energy-saving actions quickly due to the amount of consultation required, as well as the ongoing need to engage staff and students in steps they can take to reduce energy usage, as highlighted through the StepChange campaign.

The report noted future plans for carbon management at Imperial, including new processes to review building projects and influence sustainable options in design, and the development of further awareness and publicity campaigns.

To read more about Facilities Management’s approach to sustainability, visit the website; http://www3.imperial.ac.uk/sustainability

Student System on ICIS – upcoming change to its online location

Staff who use the Student System (SAMS) on ICIS are advised that from early December access will be via a new URL

At 17.00 on 9 December 2011, ICT will be transferring all the responsibilities within ICIS associated with the Student System to a new online location.  This change, which means ICIS will be unavailable over the weekend of 10-11 December, will enable the upgrade of the Finance, HR and Grants systems within ICIS, and should impact only those staff members who use the Student System.

From the morning of Monday 12 December onwards, those wishing to access the Student System will need to do so via a new link, which will be signposted on the following webpage: http://www3.imperial.ac.uk/ict/services/businesssystems/icis/icissplit. The login details required to gain access will remain the same.

Staff wishing to access the responsibilities remaining within ICIS (HR, Finance, Grants) will continue to use the same ICIS login and URL as before.

More information about the project is available at the link above. Any queries should be directed to the ICT Service Desk, either by email service.desk@imperial.ac.uk, phone (ext. 49000) or via their website: http://www3.imperial.ac.uk/ict/servicedesk

Survey on Professional Web Pages (PWPs)

A review is underway of Professional Web Pages (PWPs), which are used on the College website to offer contact details and information about the activities of staff such as publications and awards. To guide a redesign of PWPs, staff are invited to participate in a survey to help identify the content and features which are particularly important for current and future users of these online profiles. The survey should take about five minutes to complete, and all those who complete the survey will be entered into a draw to win a £100 Amazon voucher.

Access the survey here

Review of professional development provision for postgraduate students and early career researchers

The Management Board agreed to implement the recommendations resulting from the Strategic Education Committee’s Review of Professional Development for Postgraduate Students and Early Career Researchers.

These recommendations include a renewed focus for transferable skills programmes – they should help students to gain skills that they may not practice as part of the core academic programme, which equip them as leaders and innovators. Examples include teamwork and leadership skills and business awareness.

Among the other proposals agreed were that the Graduate Schools would support MSc coordinators in their efforts to embed transferable skills training in Master’s programmes; that the role of Mentor should be developed for research students to include responsibility for overseeing an individual student’s professional development; that an online tool should be introduced to enable students, with their mentor, to manage a personal development plan by setting targets and tracking progress; and that there should be more effective mechanisms of career advice for both postgraduate students and early career researchers.

A proposal to develop a professional development programme for undergraduate students will be presented at the next Management Board.

Illegal use at the College of software program ‘Mathematica’

Following the illegal use of software at Imperial, the College is required to publish the following notice to all staff.

It has come to the College’s attention that unauthorised copies of the software program ‘Mathematica’, owned by Wolfram Research Inc. (Wolfram), have been in use within the College. Such use is not only contrary to College policy, it is illegal.

Members of College are reminded that under the terms of the College Policy on the use of IT Facilities, users must not use, download, copy, store or supply copyright materials including software and retrieved data other than with the permission of the copyright holder or under the terms of a licence held by the College or individual.  Any use of unauthorised software is a serious offence subject to disciplinary action.  Details of the relevant policy are available at:

http://www3.imperial.ac.uk/secretariat/policiesandpublications/informationsystemssecurity/policy/policy2

If College members wish to use the Mathematica software a legitimate copy must be purchased either from the ICT Shop or directly from Wolfram.   The College recommends that purchases of the software be made through the ICT software shop as the College is able to offer the software at competitive prices.

In order to minimise the risk of use of unauthorised copies of Mathematica software within College, and to assist the College in detecting any unauthorised use, the College has implemented the following procedures:

  • All copies of Mathematica software used by College members will require an authorised licence key.  This licence key must be registered with ICT via the ICT Service Desk as soon as possible following purchase of the software.
  • ICT will monitor use of Mathematica licences and any unregistered licence will be blocked until such time as the user of the software is able to show that the licence is legitimate.
  • The College will then investigate all reported cases of unauthorised use and take appropriate steps to ensure that the software is either properly licensed or deleted from the offending computer. College disciplinary processes will be invoked should this be appropriate.

Online safety incident reporting system

The Safety Department has launched a new system for staff and students to report accidents, ‘near misses’ or other safety incidents. The new online tool, called ‘Salus’, asks users for information about when the incident took place, where in the College it occurred, what happened, who was affected or involved, and the actions taken. The details are then submitted to the Safety Department.

To access the system, click on the ‘Salus’ graphic on the right of the website here.

Auto sleep for College PCs to help save energy

New software is available for all ICT managed Windows PCs to make computers go into ‘Sleep’ mode more reliably after a user-defined period of inactivity. The ‘Sleep’ button, which has been on the desktops of all College PCs since September 2010, can still be used to put computers to sleep, but, if users forget, the ‘Auto-sleep’ functionality will kick in.

To activate the ‘Auto-sleep’ functionality:

  • Restart your computer for the software to be automatically installed
  • Double click on the ‘Auto-sleep’ (zzz) icon that appears on your task bar (bottom right-hand corner of the screen)
  • Accept the terms and conditions
  • Tick the “Put this machine to sleep” option
  • Set the length of time after which your computer will go to sleep when idle and click OK to start saving power

For further details, visit: http://www.imperial.ac.uk/ict/green/autosleep