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Visit UTRGV Support CenterIT and Data Governance
The University of Texas Rio Grande Valley’s (UTRGV) IT and Data Governance program ensures that before information resources or technology products, services or subscriptions are purchased or implemented, they align with UTRGV’s mission, strategic plan and objectives. In addition, it is designed to avoid duplicative technologies and increase collaboration on technology initiatives across the University.
To accomplish these goals, the IT and Data Governance program is composed of:
- An integrated organization with clearly defined areas of accountability, decision rigths, roles and responsibilities.
- An efficient and transparent request submission process, including emergencies/escalations.
- Dedicated committee members who carefully evaluate technology purchases and projects in order to approve and prioritize those that benefit UTRGV the most.
Objectives
- Allow the University community to drive decisions about technology and data in accordance with UTRGV’s mission, strategic plan and objectives.
- Avoid duplicative technologies.
- Increase collaboration on technology initiatives across the University.
- Develop a technology funding and resource utilization model.
- Leverage University technology resources, including data, as a strategic asset.
The chart below illustrates how the committees are organized so they may each perform their role and responsibilities, which are further defined in the Committees & Memberships page.
Read the IT and Data Governance Organization.
Vision
People, processes, tools, and governance that enable UTRGV to harness the power of information and technology to innovate and transform the institution and the region.
Guiding Principles for Technology
- Consider technology for its ease of use, maintainability, security and accessibility.
- Best-practice business processes must be used in order for technology to work.
- Data is a critical asset of the University that should be used to make informed decisions; we must define data access rights, and maintain data integrity in all processes and applications.
- Use consistent technology architectures where possible, including with other UT components.
- Reuse before buy: Leverage existing applications and infrastructure. Duplicative technology must include a plan to retire existing application(s).
- Buy before build: Only build solutions that do not exist in the marketplace.
- Utilize industry standards; Consider new technologies that challenge the status quo.
Key Priorities
Educational Technology Goals
- Minimize technology related disruptions in the learning environment
- Develop scalable infrastructure to support distance and/or blended education in all classrooms
- Develop a mobile-first learning infrastructure
Research Support Goals
- Provide a common research data center
- Provide a virtual cluster farm and infrastructure to quickly provision servers for research.
- Provide tools to enable research analytics (quantitative and qualitative).
Administrative Services Goals
- Improve/optimize business processes to make better use of UTRGV resources
Scope
What requires IT & Data Governance Approval?
All technology purchases, initiatives or implementations, regardless of purchase cost/amount, must be reviewed by Information Technology and the Information Security Office to determine whether approval by the appropriate IT & Data Governance committee(s) is needed.
To initiate the review process, members of the UTRGV community must follow the steps outlined in the Get Started page before they seek to purchase or implement:
- New technology products (software and hardware), services, subscriptions or contracts.
- Amendments to existing contracts that include purchasing and/or implementing additional products or services.
- Upgrades to existing products.
Examples of technology initiatives and implementations that will require approval are below:
- Resources outside of proposing department, unit or college are required to fund, implement or support. Or
- The proposed solution/ product does duplicate existing UTRGV Technology partially or completely. If this is the case, the request to the Governance committee must have a plan or roadmap to replace the existing solution, or it must meet critical needs that the existing solution does not address. Or
- The proposed application or solution does use or store confidential data, such as but not limited to, PHI, HIPAA, FERPA, Credit Card or any type that is listed in the Extended list of Confidential Data.
- The requesting office or department is seeking funding from the institution.
