Get IAM Done. Better. Faster. Together

By Apryl Motley - Technical Writer & Communications Lead, Internet2 Trust and Identity/NET+ Service

Estimated reading time: 5 minutes

2022-23 InCommon Collaboration Success Program Cohort Currently Under Way

Collaboration around access and identity lifecycle management continues. The 2022-23 Cohort of the InCommon Collaboration Success Program (CSP) kicked off in September. There are nine institutions participating in this year’s cohort:

Tufts University	University of New Brunswick
University of California, Santa Barbara	University of Virginia
University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign	University of Washington
University of Massachusetts, Amherst	West Chester University of Pennsylvania
	Winston-Salem State University

These organizations will work together through May 2023. At the conclusion of the program, participants will become alumni contributors, joining their peers at 28 other research and education institutions that have participated in CSP. The organizations participating in the current cohort joined to take advantage of all that CSP offers to Get IAM Done. Better. Faster. Together. 

Problem Solving to Remove Roadblocks (Better)

At the start of the program, organizations identify specific projects related to InCommon’s Trusted Access Platform on which they plan to focus during their time in the cohort. 

For example, according to Anne Tacazon, IAM service manager at the University of Washington, her team’s focus will be to explore and gather requirements to deploy COManage. “We want to understand its capabilities as well as its limitations,” she explained. 

Meanwhile, the University of Virginia recently kicked off a project to implement Grouper as its solution for centralized group management. “We currently have a homegrown centralized group management system that is not integrated with our identity solution,” explained Mark Cox, the university’s director, Identity Services & Solutions. “We need to replace it with a modern integrated group management solution.”

University of California, Santa Barbara, also has goals for updating and modernizing its IAM systems with plans to evaluate the viability of Trusted Access Platform components as they look toward an identity governance and administration (IGA) solution. “It’s time to update our installation and configuration of Shibboleth, and we are looking for possible enhancements/improvements or best practices,” observed Jim Woods, the university’s director of Cloud & Identity Services. 

Taurean Russel, chief information security officer at Winston-Salem State University, communicated a similar goal for participating in the CSP: “At the end of the program, we hope to understand the processes and infrastructure needed to host our Shibboleth IDP and proxy through Azure.”

“By the end of the program, we hope to understand and plan the technology needed to help streamline or replace our current or outdated applications,” he continued.

Accelerating Progress Toward a Solution (Faster)

Participation in the InCommon Collaboration Success Program has become synonymous with making significant progress toward achieving IAM goals. This in part accounts for 20 percent of CSP alumni institutions returning to the program to participate in another cohort. 

University of Massachusetts, Amherst (CSP Class of 2020) and University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign (CSP Class of 2018), have returned this year to participate in the program for a second time as their work toward their respective goals for IAM continues. 

Stephen Battisti, architect at UMass Amherst noted “the need to find a replacement for the university’s custom identity management (IDM) solution.”

According to Erik Coleman, IAM architect at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, having implemented Grouper and Shibboleth, his team continues its work “to reduce technical debt and enhance our IAM infrastructure by evaluating the capabilities of midPoint as an Identity Governance and Administration (IGA) tool.”

Peer Support and Network (Together)

As they work toward achieving their respective goals for IAM, members of this year’s cohort will have the unique opportunity for frequent interaction with their peers in a small group setting where they will discuss specific IAM implementations and their associated challenges and opportunities. 

“We are hoping to glean best practices from our interactions with other CSP cohort members,” noted Kevin Partridge, deputy CIO and executive director at West Chester University of Pennsylvania. 

University of New Brunswick Identity Architect Ben Steeves echoed this sentiment: “We want to develop a support network with other CSP members and the InCommon community as a whole.”

Similarly, Michael McNulty, senior product manager at Tufts University, views CSP as a forum for “learning from and connecting with peer institutions regarding best practices and approaches.”

Thus the collaboration continues amongst newcomers and established members of the InCommon community as they take advantage of the wonderful opportunity CSP offers to Get IAM Done. Better. Faster. Together. 

About the CSP

CSP supports institutions’ identity and access management (IAM) goals through a cohort-driven program that promotes collaboration among participants, program alumni, seasoned community implementers, and subject matter experts. 

Key features of the program include:

• Personalized assessments with suggested actions to advance IAM plans
• Eight seats in the InCommon Trusted Access Platform training for Shibboleth, Grouper, COmanage, and midPoint
• Hosted workbench to model plans with the containerized InCommon software suite
• Priority access to developers and community implementers
• CSP attracts organizations that embrace the IAM community to help flesh out their plans, identify what to tackle first, and get training and tailored support along the way. This year’s cohort includes seven new and two returning participants.

Interested in learning more? Please visit the CSP web page for more details about the program or email training@incommon.org.

ICYMI

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