From Scorecard to Service: The Collaborative Features and Functionality of NET+ Miro Are a Win for the R&E Cloud Community

Estimated reading time: 4 minutes

According to Miro Solutions Engineer Adrian Casas, the newest service to join the NET+ portfolio is the virtual collaboration platform for research and education (R&E).  “It’s an online workspace that enables teams, whether that’s students, faculty, or staff to collaborate together in a shared visual space in person, remotely, or a combination of the two, synchronously or asynchronously,” Casas explained during a recent webinar. “Miro provides you with collaborative features and functionalities to help your teams communicate more effectively.”

This isn’t news to Matthew D’Emilio, director of university contracts at Carnegie Mellon University (CMU). CMU campuses started using the free version of Miro during the COVID-19 pandemic, prompting D’Emilio to reach out to the service provider to establish a relationship. In the process, he encouraged Miro to complete an Internet2 Cloud Scorecard and sponsored its NET+ Service Evaluation.

During our recent webinar, “NET+ Miro Introduction,” Casas and D’Emilio were joined by Matthew Burgess, director of learning technology services at University of Virginia and Brad Weiger, also a solutions engineer at Miro, for a panel discussion about  the new NET+ Miro service offering and the NET+ Service Evaluation process. (Watch the recording now.)

Community and Collaboration

During the webinar, D’Emilio recalled, “At the time, I said to the Miro rep, ‘Did you ever think of  completing the Cloud Scorecard for Internet2? It would be beneficial for you to at least dip your toe into this because it’s important that everybody knows that other people are using this tool.’” 

“Our teaching and learning people were saying that [Miro] is a game changer,” he continued. “From that point of view, I like to make sure the community knows what everybody else is doing. Then we can all collaborate on the back end, which is important.” 

UVA’s Burgess echoed the importance of collaboration in the R&E cloud community: “Being a part of this [evaluation] offered us the opportunity to come together with other institutions, pool our collective knowledge skills and experience, and then share that knowledge, skill, and experience with the Miro team so that they understand our collective experience and some of the more unique needs of higher education.” 

“This collaboration has been hugely beneficial,” he shared with attendees. “It has been more successful for all of us than proceeding one institution at a time and having the same set of conversations one institution at a time.”

NET+ Program Manager Quyen Valliant moderated this important discussion (with NET+ Program Development Manager Tara Gyenis serving as host). “It was a very collaborative effort on the community side and from NET+.  Everybody came to the table wanting to work together and come to a compromise – a solution that works for everybody,” Valliant said. “We continue to work very closely with the Miro team, and we are developing best practices and guidelines for deployment by campuses.” 

In addition to Carnegie Mellon and University of Virginia, four other institutions participated in the Miro NET+ Service Evaluation: Harvard University, Harvey Mudd College, University of California San Francisco, and University of California Berkeley.

Instant Replay

If you missed it, don’t worry! You can still benefit from the highlights shared about the NET+ Miro Program and hear how your peers are leveraging it on their campuses. 

• Watch the recording. 
• View the presentation. 
• Learn more about the NET+ Miro Program. 

As always, reach out to netplus@internet2.edu with any questions you have or to receive a copy of the Miro Customer Agreement package for review.

ICYMI

NET+ Miro Collaboration Paves Way for Expanded Adoption by R&E Community