I think we could take the uportal open source program and customize it for Mission - and that would give us the campus, group, department, faculty, and student  email and communication abilities - see below

open source

see http://www.campustechnology.com/articles/40995/

uportal see

http://www.uportal.org/

Lynn University my uportal

https://my.lynn.edu/render.userLayoutRootNode.uP

Dennison University uportal

From the JA-SIG website: "uPortal is a free, sharable portal under development by institutions of higher-education. This group sees an institutional portal as an abridged and customized version of the institutional Web presence... a "pocket-sized" version of the campus Web. Portal technology adds "customization" and "community" to the campus Web presence. Customization allows each user to define a unique and personal view of the campus Web. Community tools, such as chat, forums, survey, and so on, build relationships among campus constituencies."

"uPortal is an open-standard effort using Java, XML, JSP and J2EE. It is a collaborative development project with the effort shared among several of the JA-SIG member institutions. You may download uPortal and use it on your site at no cost."

uPortal powers our campus portal, myDENISON.

let me know your thoughts.

dj

-- 
David Jordan, Esq. - Attorney at Law -  Director Los Angeles Mission College Paralegal Studies Program
13356 Eldridge Ave, Sylmar, Ca 91342-3200
cell phone = 818-415-2015, school = 818-364-7720
home law page - http://lamission.edu/law Chair of Distance Education Committee - http://lamission.edu/de Chair of Technology Committee - http://lamission.edu/facstaff/technology