Financial Services Office

FSO Monthly Newsletter Archive
 

The University of Arizona


April, 2007

In this edition:

1. Business Community Open Forum (BCOF) - Today, 4/26, 2-3:30 pm
2. FSO Website Redesign
3. Kuali Project Update
4. Stop the presses
5. FSO By the Numbers - Information Services Web (ISW)
6. Frequently Asked Questions - 07/08 work hours
7. Introducing FSO's New Employees

**************************
1. Business Community Open Forum (BCOF)

Please join us today, April 26, 2-3:30 pm, in the Student Union, North Ballroom for the Business Community Open Forum. The topic for today's meeting is "The University Budget - The Big Picture." Participants are asked to bring a photo of themselves and their co workers to the meeting.

The Open Forum is open to anyone who has an interest in the University's business policies and processes. The purpose is to provide information to and solicit concerns from members of the business community, and serve as a networking opportunity for the business community with their peers and central administration.

A listserv (mailto:centraladmin@listserv.arizona.edu) has been set up as a method for suggesting future topics, asking questions and/or voicing concerns to the panelists off line.

****************************
2. FSO Website Redesign

FSO is in the process of redesigning its website and would like your help. Please review our draft site at http://new.fso.arizona.edu and send your comments, questions, or concerns to Betsy Van Valkenburg at mailto:ejv@arizona.edu or 626-8209. We would like to hear from you by Friday May 4th if possible as we hope to have the site live by the 1st of June. Thank you for helping FSO provide the University community with a valuable web resource.

******************************
3. Kuali Project Update

-Leslie Tolbert (VP for Research), Michele Norin (Executive Director of CCIT), Charles Ingram (AVP for Financial Services) and Sherry Esham (Director of Sponsored Projects) are forming a working committee to develop a Kuali Project Implementation Proposal that will encompass all Kuali initiatives taking place on campus: Kuali Financial System, Kuali Research Administration, Kuali Enterprise Workflow and Kuali Rice (http://rice.kuali.org/).

The committee has been charged with developing an implementation proposal detailing:

• The critical path and integration points of each component
• The associated costs of each component and integration
• The total costs (expenditures to date and future expenditures) and
• The annual ongoing costs.

Opportunities will be available to provide input into the proposal. Once the proposal is complete, it will be provided to the President and other decision makers for approval.

-Kuali Days IV, May 21-22, is being held in St. Louis - to register and/or for more information visit http://kuali.org.

Kuali Days is a great way to learn more about Kuali and for the first time a session will be held on Kuali Research Administration. We continue to add concurrent sessions and each time we get to see more Kuali and less of Indiana University's FIS (Financial Information System).

-Phase 2A development continues and development is scheduled to be complete July 1. Following the moratorium on development, a 3 month Quality Assurance period will occur and the next release which includes Purchasing/AP, Contracts & Grants (including Budget Builder and Proposal Routing Sheet) and Labor Distribution will be released October 2007.

-Kuali is holding face to face testing sessions at Arizona for the release 2A modules with representatives from each school. Testers will be sequestered in a room for 1 1/2 days to do some hard core testing in preparation for the Quality Assurance period.

-Campus updates resuming - as soon as the Purchase Requisition is released and fairly stable, we will schedule some campus updates. We'll also demo the "kualified" Contracts & Grants module and the Labor Distribution module.

For more info: http://kuali.org/

****************************
4. Stop the presses

Several years ago we considered no longer printing and distributing FRS reports, however, a couple of technical difficulties required that we hold off. Those issues have been resolved and, in order for FSO to meet it's mandated budget cuts, we hope to "Stop the Presses" by September 30, 2007.

To facilitate a smooth transition for those of you who are still receiving printed reports, we will be holding information/training sessions to answer questions and ensure that everyone is comfortable getting reports out of ISW and/or having them emailed as pdf files. eMailed reports are delivered as soon as we receive them into ISW, usually, the Saturday after close.

Our anticipated stop date is September 30th, so we will have plenty of time to address any concerns or issues that we may have missed.

If you want to get a head start, contact mailto:support@fso.arizona.edu and request that your FRS reports stop being printed, include your department numbers.

Questions/concerns can be directed to Kymber Horn, mailto:kymber@arizona.edu, 621-8615.

****************************
5. FSO By the Numbers - Information Services Web (ISW)

Information Services Web, http://www.fso.arizona.edu/isw/ served 4,830 campus users with 863 distinct reports and hosted 66 campus and departmental applications in fiscal year 2005/2006.

****************************
6. Frequently Asked Questions

--Your Question: How many work hours will there be in fiscal year 2007-08?

--Reply: The work hours in fiscal year 2007-2008 are 2088. This information is located in the in the Systems Control Calculation Survival Guide at http://web.arizona.edu/~syscon/docs/Surv2007.xls

FSO maintains a database of frequently asked questions. Visit our FAQ page at http://www.fso.arizona.edu/app/faq/faq.asp to review previously asked questions, search by category or keyword, or ask a question of your own.

****************************

7. Introducing FSO's New Employees:

Lorena Ainza, Office Specialist, Senior - FSO Operations
Jolene Elliott, Office Specialist, Senior - FSO Operations
Megan Sego, Office Specialist, Senior - FSO Operations


Contact: Kymber Horn