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Portal Growing Pains: Aligning to Your Institutional Goals

Portal Growing Pains: Aligning to Your Institutional Goals. William P. Wilson Director, IT Strategic Planning & Assessment Mark Albert Web Programmer/Analyst. Institutional Goals. Overview Exemplary Use of Technology First-Year Orientation Support Life-Long Connections Career Connections

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Portal Growing Pains: Aligning to Your Institutional Goals

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  1. Portal Growing Pains: Aligning to Your Institutional Goals William P. Wilson Director, IT Strategic Planning & Assessment Mark Albert Web Programmer/Analyst

  2. Institutional Goals • Overview • Exemplary Use of Technology • First-Year Orientation Support • Life-Long Connections • Career Connections • Classroom Connections • Student Services

  3. Gettysburg Portal History • Launched in 1997 for students, employees, and faculty • Alumni added in 1998 • Parents added in 1999 • Accepted students in 2001 • Applicants in 2002

  4. Orientation Process • IT recognized First Year Orientation process as a candidate for change • Approached College Life with concept of electronic forms and information • Convinced Office of Student Activities and First-Year Programs to try web-based forms on a trial basis. Paper formed mailed with an web option.

  5. First-Year Orientation • Goals for 2004 • Web-based forms as option for paper (10 forms) • Web-based forms automatically populate fields we already had information for • Increase accuracy, improve participation rates (e.g., Volunteering), get 60% returned electronically, more timely access to information to offices

  6. Customer Concerns • IT would not be ready in time • It was new and therefore scary • Office was convinced web-based was the way to go but felt students would be slow to adopt this approach resulting in more data-entry for the staff

  7. IT Sales Pitch • Pre-populated data where available provided better data and service • More web-based than paper • More timely reporting of data • Better data (fewer data entry issues) • Forms located in portal that students were already using for other communications

  8. Orientation 2004 • Mailing sent to all new students in May with a June 20th deadline • Packet contained • Five required formsCourse Registration, Advisor Letter, Housing, Grade Report, Advising Worksheet • Nine optional formsVolunteer Day, Ascent Trip, Music Interest, Purchase options including t-shirt, newspaper, and more

  9. Orientation 2004 Results • 98% of forms returned via web • More forms submitted by deadline • Higher participation in optional activities • Data reporting became more timely • Integrated Credit Card payment option increased revenue • Trust established & improved process

  10. Orientation 2005 • No paper forms • Would use data to populate our ERPs • Collect more information • Better reporting • Improved user interface • More campus-wide involvement spearheaded by College Life

  11. Orientation 2005 Changes • 100% web-based forms • Cost savings in form printing allowed for upgraded quality of printing of other materials • Increased communications with College Life and new students because of web-integrated communications within the module – including Instant Messaging

  12. Campus Benefits • Students use the portal for more things during the summer, reducing training needs • Information to offices sooner • Provided an impetus for better business process for data collection • Student use of College e-mail prior to arrival on campus

  13. Student Satisfaction • I really enjoyed sending my forms on-line because then I didn't have to face the frustrations of papers being here, there, and everywhere. I thought the way the forms were organized was wonderful and it was really easy to figure out how to fill them in. • It was really easy to fill out the forms and was really well planned out and simple. • Overall, I found CNAV to be easy to use and very convenient. It is a much better alternative to paperwork.

  14. Student Criticism • Make the online registration for classes easier to navigate and understand. • Please make it more Firefox compatible. I had a lot of problems saving forms, etc. • There were a lot of technical problems at first and it was frustrating when the site wasn't running at the time they said and I was not able to get some of the forms, but all of the tech people were very helpful and encouraging.

  15. Orientation Overall Results • Increase in participations 2003-2005 • Ascent Trips: up 75% • Senate T-shirts: 28%  64% • Charge Authorization: 60%  80%* • Music Interest: 3%  23% • GIV Day: 34%  57% • Newspaper Subscriptions: 9%  26% • Yearbook added 2005  56 orders

  16. Highlights • Went from scary experiment to integrated with College processes • Changed communications model between first-year students and office • Model of non-IT unit seeing benefits and allocating resources to do some of the work • Achieved IT goals of partnering, improving a process, display intelligent use of tech

  17. Other Strategic Initiatives • Other offices with strategic implications also contacted us (vs the Orientation model of IT going to them) • One such strategic direction was the call to find ways to keep our alumni in a life-long relationship with the College • So, when Career Development approached us, we came up with …

  18. Career Connections • Idea was to have parents and alumni volunteer as mentors to current students • Volunteer for various activities (e.g., shadowing, resume review) • Selected students search for mentors based on location, profession

  19. Career Connection Results • 160 students participating • 83 volunteers contacted by students • More than 230 volunteers have expressed interest in participating • Improved process for alumni and parents to volunteer

  20. Classroom Connections • Similar program to partner parents and alumni with faculty • Enrich the classroom • Maintain strong connections to Gettysburg

  21. Classroom Connection Results • Soft-launch early 2005 • Over 70 volunteers to date, with very little advertising • No end results yet; waiting for Provost on how to introduce this resource to the faculty.

  22. Strong Student Services • Services and FAQs • Timesheet (1800+ active users) • HelpDesk and Inventory • Dining Balances • Psychology 101 experiment module

  23. e-Portfolio • Fall 2004 – college implemented new curriculum • Required postings in an e-Portfolio • Letter to First-Year Advisor (FYReg) • First-Year writing • Social Science, Natural Science, Art, and Humanities • Capstone • Cluster

  24. Current Work • Portal Integration with Web • Chose open-source CMS • Work with developer to modify it for our web and portal • Allows for some CRM features • Launch in January 2006

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