Few in the SUNY community would have ever guessed that UUP member Peter Friesen of SUNY Plattsburgh would be their angel in disguise.

This tall, thin man, who has a habit of muttering to himself when he’s onto something brilliant, has spent his days giving technical support to faculty and his nights creating an award-winning computer program that will save countless hours during SUNY Plattsburgh’s conversion from its existing course management computer system to a new system known as ANGEL (A New Global Environment for Learning).

Friesen, the instructional technology coordinator at Plattsburgh, received the ANGEL Impact Award in May for creating a software program he calls the “ConversionThingy.” The award honors Friesen’s exemplary contribution to the ANGEL and SUNY communities. It is given by the ANGEL Learning System, an online course and content management program used by colleges.

Friesen’s program is a computer application that extracts course content from the original SUNY Learning Network’s (SLN) Lotus Notes database and reconfigures it to fit the ANGEL course archives. Conversion can be long and tedious, but Friesen’s program saved hundreds of hours.

“Peter’s software development has enabled Plattsburgh to stay at the forefront of our online and distance learning,” said David Curry, UUP chapter president at Plattsburgh. “It makes us more nimble in terms of educating faculty.”

Basically, Friesen “takes the SUNY Learning Network to ANGEL with the push of a button,” added Patricia Bentley, a librarian and former UUP chapter president.

Four years ago, SUNY was told the SLN system was too expensive; individual colleges had to upgrade to ANGEL. That left SUNY campuses with the daunting task of converting their course management systems.

“Initially this was written for the faculty I was supporting at SUNY Platts-burgh,” said Friesen of the program he created in 2004. “Nothing else in SUNY did this, and there were already six to nine SUNY campuses using ANGEL.” His work not only benefited SUNY Plattsburgh, but also the 20 other SUNY campuses that subscribe to the ANGEL learning network.

“ConversionThingy” became available to all SUNY campuses after it was posted on Friesen’s Web site.

The fact that Friesen not only developed this ground-breaking software, but also let anyone in SUNY have access to it, figured into his selection for the award, said Nancy Schmutzler, a spokeswoman for ANGEL.

Friesen is quick to point out that two other SUNY employees — Stephen Simon of Empire State College and UUP member Janet Mayer of SUNY Fredonia — were also honored with ANGEL Impact Awards for their work converting their individual schools to ANGEL.

Friesen encourages members of SUNY schools converting to ANGEL to read more about “ConversionThingy” at http://faculty.plattsburgh.edu/peter.friesen/conversionthingy.

— Lindsey Hollenbaugh