The Pennsylvania State University - Administrative Information Services, a unit of Information Technology Services

Organizational Purpose

In order to reach its goal of serving the University, Administrative Information Services (AIS) has developed a vision statement, mission statement, and service philosophy.

Vision Statement

To provide a comprehensive, integrated set of administrative computing solutions that will enable The Pennsylvania State University to transform and improve the way we conduct commerce, provide customer service, and support research, teaching, and outreach.

Mission Statement

To provide efficient and effective administrative computing systems that contribute to the University's goal of integrating teaching, research, and outreach by:

  • Providing direct, electronic access to administrative services that meet the expectations of faculty, staff, students, alumni, donors, friends, customers, and prospective customers.
  • Providing tools and training for our distributed community of developers and users that are state-of-the-art, secure, and long-lasting.
  • Transforming the University's workforce from paper processes to electronic processes.

Web Site Mission Statement

This Web site serves as the primary informational resource for users of AIS through intuitive, efficient mechanisms for locating information about administrative systems and support facilities.

For information on Web site standards and styling, please refer to the AIS Web Style Guide.

Service Philosophy

The vision of AIS is to provide a comprehensive, integrated set of solutions that will enable The Pennsylvania State University to transform and improve the way we conduct commerce and provide customer service, as well as support research, teaching, and outreach. In order to effectively achieve this vision, we will be:

Positive
Be positive, professional and friendly.

Innovative
Solicit input for creative solutions to each situation respecting all opinions.

Engaged
Be proactive and provide clear, open and appropriate communications for our services and solutions.

Collaborative
Collaborate to achieve innovative solutions based on a clear understanding of our partners' requirements.

Protective
Respect the confidentiality and integrity of our partners' information and follow established processes to ensure that their information remains private and secure.

Consistent
Deliver solutions that meet our partners' long term requirements in a consistent, reliable, and cost-effective manner using proven technologies and sound business principles.

Responsive
Respond to our partners' requests by providing timely and knowledgeable service.

Reliable
Work with our partners to ensure the continued accuracy and reliability of our systems.

Open Standards Strategy

AIS strategically embraces the concept and practices of the Open Standards IT environment for enterprise application development, implementation, and deployment.

To support this strategic direction:

  • AIS will establish JAVA as the preferred programming language for future AIS application development.
  • AIS will build a J2EE enterprise application integration and deployment infrastructure to support the delivery of administrative Web-based services.

To support current applications and systems:

  • AIS will continue to maintain a robust Natural programming language and Smalltalk development environment for the foreseeable future.
  • AIS will continue to maintain a Microsoft-centric application development environment for those key applications which currently depend upon this platform, such as ANGEL. This development environment will be maintained until such time that these, or functionally similar applications, become available on an open standards-based platform.
  • AIS will continue to maintain a level of Microsoft-centric application development capability necessary to support interoperability with, and joint development of, user-office administrative applications and administrative Web-based services.

Content Questions: Mike Belinc