Zooming Ahead: The Campus Phone Upgrade

Overview

Stevens is moving to Zoom Phone, a cloud-based telephone service, to provide more flexibility, mobility and privacy to the campus community.  

Zoom Phone will be a new feature added to the Zoom application you’re already familiar with. Stevens faculty and staff can make telephone calls from the Zoom application using Zoom Phone, using your existing Stevens phone number. 

Why is the phone system being replaced? 

The current phone system on Stevens campus is an older system that relies on on-prem Cisco hardware that is no longer supported. With this replacement and upgrade to Zoom Phone Stevens will be able to utilize the scalability and flexibility of a cloud-based solution.  

What is Zoom Phone?  

Zoom Phone is a softphone service, meaning it is a downloadable application that allows you to make and receive phone calls over the internet using mobile devices and laptops. This means:

  • You’ll be able to use your Stevens phone number wherever you may be without the requirement of a VPN.  

  • You’ll no longer need to use or share your personal cell phone number for work purposes. 

  • This effort will also significantly reduce the number of desk phones used across our campus, reducing electronic waste and supporting the university’s sustainability goals. 

Zoom Phone Benefits & Features

Zoom Phone softphones offer benefits, and some additional features, that traditional telephone lines do not.  

Zoom Phone Benefits 

The following is not an exhaustive list, but some of the most prominent benefits of a softphone application for the Stevens community. 

  • Greater mobility: Full telephone functionality at home, on campus, traveling, or wherever there is an internet connection, allowing faculty and staff to seamlessly work, and have a more consistent presence, with their Stevens zoom phone number no matter where they are. 

  • Expanded privacy: Telephone abilities with a Stevens zoom phone number so faculty and staff no longer need to provide their personal number to others for work purposes. 

  • Device options: Ability to choose any combination of how the softphone application is used; Stevens-provided or personally owned laptop, desktop, mobile device or from a desk phone if needed. Also offers multi-device compatibility. 

  • Increased functionality: Comprehensive calling features, including options for when/how calls are received, contact integration, and more. These features are all available with a quick application download through an easy-to-use interface. 

  • Decreased environmental impact: A cloud-based softphone service limits physical devices and backend equipment. Eliminating the need for physical phones also eliminates the costs associated with updating, maintaining, and moving telephone lines. 

  • Efficiency with a Softphone Application: The softphone application user interface offers shortcuts and enhancements such as drag-and-drop call transfers, ability to transcribe voicemails, and voicemail-to-email service. These features will enable phone communication that is faster and easier to manage. 

  • Network flexibility: Ability to use the softphone application through most internet connections, without the requirement of a VPN. 

Zoom Phone Features 

This is not an exhaustive list of the softphone features available, but a limited list of those that may not be currently available with a physical phone. All current features available with a traditional phone will continue to be available to the university community with a softphone. 

  • Standard phone capabilities such as: call forwarding, call hold, call transfers, shared contact directory, incoming call notifications, caller information, and voicemail options. 

  • Customizable call parameters to ensure you are only getting notifications from your Stevens phone number when you want to receive notifications. 

  • Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) enables you to make and receive calls, with a Stevens number, from any of your owned devices without using your personal cell phone number. 

  • Zoom Presence from your softphone indicates when individuals are online, offline, busy or in a meeting. This enables others in the university community to know when they should reach out or when they might not get an immediate response. 

  • Effortless conference calls to easily add participants to a call and merge a call with a person who is on hold. 

  • Ability to switch a call from your softphone application on one device to another device quickly if needed. 

  • Easily switching from a voice call to Zoom Meeting (videoconferencing) without requiring participants to manually join. 

  • E911 Emergency calling from Zoom Phone Mobile App, Desktop App, or deskset. 

  • Customizable Business, closed, holiday hours. 

  • Unique Call Handling for busy, on another call, when a call is not answered, in addition to the ability to forward calls to an internal number, external number or voicemail. 

  • Call Delegation to allow another phone user to handle calls on your behalf, such as assigning an administrative or executive assistant the ability to make and receive calls on behalf of their executives. 

Project Timeline

Zoom Phone Project Timeline

Project Team

Role

Member(s)

Project Sponsor

Hammad Ali

Project Owners

Hammad Ali & Luis Quispe

Project & Change Manager

Maryam Mirza 

Project Coordinator

Ted Vallejos 

Project Technical Lead

Jayson Viray & Mauricio Castano

Communication & Training Lead

Morgan Kellogg Cua 

Learning Technology SME

Val Dumova & Wei Li 

Client Support Services SME

Frank Filogamo & Dani Doman 

Academic Multimedia Services SME

Harry Ortiz & Jesus Candiotti

Project Champions & Port Schedule

Divisions/Departments/Offices

Zoom Champion

Port Date & Status

Office of the President  

Phyllis Ruiz 

March 2024 - Complete

University Relations  

Mercedes McKay 

March 2024 - Complete

General Counsel  

ToniAnn Biondolillo 

March 2024 - Complete

Provost Operations

Frances Salvo

January 2024 - Complete

School of Engineering & Science (SES)

Robert Gonzales

January 2024 - Complete

School of Systems & Enterprises (SSE)

Leslie Jenkins

January 2024 - Complete

School of Business

Jeffrey Hedrick

January 2024 - Complete

School of Humanities, Arts & Social Science (HASS)

Andrew Stein

January 2024 - Complete

Vice Provost (Operations & Academic Administrative Offices)

Frances Salvo

January 2024 - Complete

Graduate Education

Kim Barletta

March 2024 - Complete

Office of Research & Innovation

Tugrulbey Kiryaman

January 2024 - Complete

Registrar

Jamie Kriger

January 2024 - Complete

Division of Finance   

Marcin Ceglinski 

December 2023 - Complete

Students Accounts

Mariana Diaz 

December 2023 - Complete

Division of Enrollment Management  

Nina DeMarco 

December 2023 - Complete

Division of Student Affairs  

Ashley Chillar 

December 2023 - Complete

Division of Human Resources 

Melanie Murtha  

March 2024 - Complete

Division of Facilities and Campus Operations

LaToyia Carter

March 2024- Complete

Campus Police  

Robert DiGenova & Andrew Keelan

April 2024

Division of Development & Alumni Engagement  

Joe Perz & Alyson McCarthy 

March 2024 - Complete

Division of Information Technology

Geeneh Gorji

October 2023 - Complete

Training & Support

Training & Resources

Live Training Sessions

Live training session will be hosted during each department, division, or schools migration to Zoom Phone.

All training session recordings can be found on Panopto →

On-Demand Training Resources

Zoom Phone Knowledge Base articles
Zoom Phone: Overview 
Zoom Phone: Managing Your Voicemail 
Zoom Phone: Features & Functionality 
Zoom Phone: Desk Phones 
Zoom Phone: Emergency Location Services 
Guidance and Recommendations for Zoom and Microsoft Teams Usage
How to use Polycom Blackwire 8225 Headset
How to use Logitech Zone Wired Headset

Zoom Learning Center 
Visit the Zoom Learning Center to watch the course on getting started with Zoom Phone. Please note you need to log in with your Stevens credentials to access the learning center content.  

Support

Zoom Support Portal 
Visit the Zoom Support Portal for step-by-step guides on how to get started with Zoom Phone and more. 

Should you need technical support please submit a ticket on the IT Support Portal or email support@stevens.edu.

Project Communications

Known Issues

Known Issue #1 (11/3/2023): At this time Zoom does not allow the customization of email notifications from the Zoom Phone platform. There is currently a feature request open with Zoom to be able to add Stevens branding to email notifications from Zoom Phone.  

Frequently Asked Questions

Need IT Support?

Get support through our self help resources, contacting IT support or visiting TRAC.