New Phone Update and Training

Full-time faculty colleagues...amazing new telephones and messaging capabilities are coming soon for your office phones!

The CISCO phone conversion program continues into the summer months. We want you to be fully informed about the upcoming changes so that you can plan accordingly. Because many of you may be off campus and away from your phones during this time you will want to understand how these changes will affect you. Please read this message carefully so you are fully informed.

Full-time faculty members on some campuses have already been converted to the new system and are already experiencing the improvements. Part-time faculty will not experience any changes until January of 2011.

Full-time faculty at the Truax campus will see their phones switched out beginning in late July and completed by convocation on August 17-18.  With this change you will see a new phone on your desk and the addition of a feature called “Unified Messaging”. You will receive email communications from the installation team before, during, and after your phone is installed. They will ensure your phone is working properly.

The new phones will function just as your old model did with much greater clarity and the option to use some advanced features like forwarding and call conferencing. Unified Messaging will replace your current Audix account and automatically move all voice mail messages into your Outlook (email) inbox, removing the chore of calling into Audix for your messages. 

Messages that are received on Audix while you are on summer break will be saved in that system until you return to work for the fall semester and at that time you will be able to access any messages there just as you always have. Unified Messaging is the most significant improvement you will experience; streamlining your messages and access to them.

Training and information about the new phone system and features will be available from CETL. Face to face training for how to use your new phones will be available via CETL each week throughout the summer and into the fall semester. Training sessions are posted online at the CETL registration data base. Additional face to face and drop-in sessions will be scheduled the week of August 16th (convocation) and into the fall. Printed quick reference guides and other materials are available online at CETL.

While these telecommunications tools will help improve our communications and efficiency, it’s important to remember that in the end it is quite easy to use because it is a telephone. Enjoy your summer experiences and if you have questions give us a call!  

Patrick Barlow