Manoo Ordeedolchest, chairman of the committee for ICT policy at Sripatum University, said the university had been improving its ICT infrastructure with the aim of utilising technologies to build data-mining facilities for executives of the university as well as to provide ICT facilities and electronic services for students.

The investment plan is divided into two phases covering two years. The first phase was started last September while the second phase is scheduled to start by the end of this year and to be complete by the end of next year.

The first phase involves the development of back-office systems to assist the executives' policy decisions. The second phase includes electronic services for students.

"Around Bt20 million to Bt30 million is a software investment. The rest is hardware -  PCs, servers, data storage and networks," said Manoo.

Apart from the ICT infrastructure upgrade, Sripatum University will also launch the "Information Service Institute" scheme with the concept of providing training courses, with certification from the university, for various people.

Under the plan, there are three initial training courses including Web Software Engineering, CMMi (Capability Maturity Model Integration), and Service Science.

The Web Software Engineering course, scheduled to begin next month, is a six-month course including class work and internships. This programme targets vocational students, university students and people who have already studied at least two or three programming subjects.

"Each course provides 40 students with four to five subjects. Every student must have their own notebook computer. Students from this course will be given a chance to join Software Park Thailand's incubation centre scheme," said Manoo.

The university plans to collaborate with CMMi experts to provide the CMMi course for software development process improvement.

The programme targets local software houses to not only help them reduce the cost of software development but also assist them to improve their software development process to the solid and recognised international CMMi standards.

It is a process improvement approach that provides organisations with the essential elements of effective processes. CMMi helps integrate traditionally separate organisational functions, set process improvement goals and priorities, provide guidance for quality processes, and provide a point of reference for appraising current processes.

The course will be kicked off by the end of this year with four to five professional training subjects.

It targets individuals rather than companies. People who finished this course will get a diploma from Sripatum University.

Meanwhile, the Service Science course is a collaboration with seven other universities and IBM Thailand. It starts with IT services covering maintaining computer systems, virus protection and security management.

"Around 60 to 70 per cent of the world economy comes from service businesses including healthcare, tourism and medical services. The quality of services always depends on humans. That's why we initiated this kind of course, which utilises science to control the quality of people in service fields. The course also focuses on service-science research and development. It initially targets computer system administrators," said Manoo.

All the moves aim to make Sripatum University recognised as an ICT-related university that is committed to creating quality graduates with ICT literacy for industry for students from all faculties. The university has 10 faculties and 24,000 students.

Asina Pornwasin

The Nation