RGU Select Evoke IT for new SharePoint portal development

 

​Evoke IT have been chosen by Robert Gordon University to develop their new SharePoint portal. The major contract for the Aberdeen SharePoint specialists, involves SharePoint consultancy, development and training.

 

The portal will let staff and students access course materials and schedules from any location, on or off Campus. Students will find out what’s due that day, which deadlines are approaching and read any other important information or news all on the same page. Teaching staff will see similar information, and will also be able to keep track of assignments and communicate with their students. They will also be able to log in to their emails, social media accounts and workspaces from the same starting point, making communication quicker and easier.

Evoke IT’s involvement started with extensive research into the actual requirements of the end users through lab and face to face sessions, before moving into the design of the user interface, the creation of the SharePoint portal architecture and considerable custom development to ensure that the portal meets the specific and varied needs which have been established. They have had to work extremely closely with several teams within RGU to integrate SharePoint seamlessly with the other systems currently being used at the University.

Andrew McCreath, Executive Director (Information Technology and Comm) at Robert Gordon University commented, “We decided to base our portal on Microsoft SharePoint because of its immense flexibility and scalability as well as its ease of use for the students. Evoke IT are extremely knowledgeable about SharePoint and have implemented our progressive ideas efficiently, providing us with a dynamic and modern SharePoint portal which will meet the current and future needs of our staff and students.”

 

Throughout the project, Evoke IT have involved RGU’s in-house IT department in the development process so that they are gradually acquiring the SharePoint knowledge and skills they will need to manage and administer the portal successfully after the final handover. According to Lee Harrison, Director of Evoke IT, “Skills transfer is a vital part of every project we undertake. It is important to us that the client’s IT department are comfortable with using every aspect of the vast resource that is SharePoint and are able to maintain it on a day to day basis.”

Evoke IT and the Robert Gordon University team will work together to create and deliver a large-scale training scheme to prepare staff, students and the IT department for the university-wide launch of the project in the summer of 2012.