Release 2026.12

In Progress: ITS Priorities for the 2026.12 Release Cycle

With the capital projects delivered and the academic year underway, 2026.12 turns to platforms, governance in practice, and resilience. It is the cycle in which the IT Steering Committee stops being a design and starts being a standing conversation, and in which the recovery capability behind every other system moves from a plan to something we have actually tested.

Delivered So Far This Cycle

• Overleaf campus-wide: The collaborative LaTeX editor is licensed for every CMC account and wired to campus single sign-on, with a launching page explaining who is covered and how to sign in.
• This website: After a preview period with the ITS team and campus partners, the new ITS site launches on September 14 and the beta notice comes down with it.
• A live system status page: The status dashboard now reads directly from the ITS status service rather than waiting for someone to update a page by hand.
• Policy on the road: The Responsible Secure Computing Policy, the Data Classification Standard, and the steering committee were introduced to the faculty in September.

1. Governance in Practice

• IT Steering Committee launch: With membership confirmed in 2026.08, the committee holds its inaugural session. First on the agenda: the secure computing policy, data classification, and how procurements and renewals will be reviewed going forward.
• Training that reaches everyone: Policy and data classification content is being built into the annual compliance modules, with a practical focus on handling sensitive data and recognizing scams. The platform that delivers it is being re-evaluated alongside Human Resources.
• Compliance and assurance: The first phase of the college’s GLBA deliverables is being completed and evidenced, and a tabletop exercise walks ITS and campus partners through a security incident before one happens.
• Platform reviews: Options for event and room scheduling are being evaluated alongside the course scheduling work below, and the college’s form-building platform is under review for accessibility and data handling.

2. The Platforms the Community Uses

• Pathify student hub beta: A beta of the new student hub goes to students this cycle. The full portal launch now follows in 2027.08 rather than here — the portal is the page the campus starts its day on, and it is worth the extra cycle.
• CourseDog: Implementation begins on a modern course and academic scheduling platform with the Registrar, giving a job that spans the student system, room reservations, and the catalog a purpose-built home.
• FreshService for HR and Finance: The service management platform extends to Human Resources and Finance, with supply chain and web request workflows alongside it and a first set of automations in beta.
• Onboarding 2.0, HR beta: Hiring, account provisioning, equipment, and access come together into one coordinated arrival experience for new employees. Full release follows in 2027.04.
• In beta and early access: The redesigned Inform request process opens to early users, and the knowledge base enters beta as the home for ITS documentation and the foundation for self-service.
• Interfolio faculty search: Carried from 2026.08, the launch completes and the custom faculty search application is retired.

3. Institutional Resilience

• A replacement disaster recovery solution: Cloud failover moves from a design to a tested capability. The data is already replicated; the remaining work is the network and coordination design that makes a full failover possible — and then exercising it. It is the largest cross-team item on the roadmap.
• Architecture map (beta): A living map of how CMC’s systems, integrations, and data flows connect — which makes impact analysis sharper, incident response faster, and audit conversations shorter. A 1.0 release follows in 2027.04.
• Asset visibility, phase 2: AV equipment across classrooms and event spaces, following the workstation inventory completed in 2026.08.

4. Finishing What We Started

• Subdomain (final): Completing the domain strategy set out in 2025.08 — a structure that gives CMC room to integrate new services cleanly and strengthens campus email at the same time.
• Sports Bowl day two: Baseball, softball, the remaining press box spaces, and the last of the scoreboard and venue systems, carried from 2026.08 now that the main complex is in service.
• An audio tour for the Robert Day Sciences Center: Also carried from 2026.08 — a self-guided tour for visitors and prospective students.

Beyond 2026.12

• 2027.04 — a consolidation cycle: the betas of this release become standard practice, alongside the next phase of compliance work and centralized domain management.
• 2027.08 — the Pathify portal launch, and the consortium’s launch of a new student information system on July 1, 2027.