Student Systems Partnership14/15 Programme Review
The SSP programme supports and develops the student and academic administrative systems in the context of the University strategy. Impact of this year programme of work on the Student Systems Roadmap 2013-2016 for the following strands:
- Self Service
What has been delivered
Students are now able to downloadadditional student related administrative documents.
Online registration: Students are now using the updated on line process to register for the 2014/15 Academic Year.
Benefits
Efficiency
Further reduction in the administrative process: as of mid-August 2015, the number of additional documents downloaded since June 2015: 115 Bank Introduction Letters (will increase at the beginning of Semester 1), and 96 Transcript of Marks. Since October 2014: 1,598 Student Academic Statements were downloaded.
Ongoing annual efficiency: students are registering earlier and staffs are spending less time on the process. Over July and August 2015, 7,385students have completed the registration, compared with 3,565 students over the same period two years ago using the paper forms keyed in by staff. / Student Experience
Students can download more administrative documents any time, any place and on any device.
The registration process is delivered online and will save students completing a paper form and posting or scanning this back to the University to change. International students are now able to upload their passport and visa documents into EUCLID through self-service. / What’s next
Enhancements planned for collaboration/Center for Doctoral Training (CDT) administration and PGResearch student administration.
Opportunity to further review the data available to students, relationship between EUCLID and MyEd and the range of processes and documents students can self-serve beyond traditional ‘registry processes’.
Opportunity to review staff facing administrative process relating to students: matriculation; programme changes; assessment.
- Assessment
What has been delivered
Progression decisions are recorded against the student in EUCLID. This work supports the University as it seeks to enhance the processes that support assessment & feedback and the communication of results to students.
Development of EUCLID Assessment and Progression tools.IT tools to allow a pilot to be run in a small number of schools for a limited number of programmes and courses in2015/16.
Benefits
Efficiency
All Staff have access to record and publish progression decisions to taught students, these decisions are now held on the student record.Revised business processes are in place to meet the requirement to communicate progression to students.
Pilot schools have the ability to set up assessment structures,efficiently enter marks for assessment components and calculate overall course marks. / Student Experience
This provides a consistent and timely method of communication of progression to students including details of what they need to do next. Schools are recording the progression in the student record, including of any actions required to progress (e.g. details of reassessments).Students are sent an email which prompts them to look at their progression decision and the actions that they have to take if any. The progression decisions are made available in EUCLID via student self-service andlinks to school specific-webpages detailing the support available.Personal Tutors have access to the information to assist their discussions with their tutees. By the publication deadline date (30 June) over 18,500 progression decisions had been communicated to students through EUCLID - over90% of students who should have received a decision did so by this deadline. / What’s next
The project will continue to develop tools to support the pilot schools during 2015/16 and in preparation for 2016/17 when it is planned for all schools currently using SMART to be using EUCLID.
-Students will be able to view course component marks (including pre-board in-year assessment where appropriate) through EUCLID
-Personal Tutors will have access to the same in-year course component marks as the student, which will help inform discussions in Personal Tutor meetings
-Administrative processes will be supported by streamlining of board processes and EUCLID tools to support:
- Processing of re-assessments
- Transfer of marks from other systems (e.g. LEARN)
- Auditing of changes to marks
- Progression and award/classification board processes, including calculation of recommended progression/classification decisions and online boards
- Processing and tracking of Special Circumstances decisions
- Admissions
What has been delivered
Bursary: streamline payment process and delivery of online application form for 2015/16.
Direct Admissions: the EUCLID Applicant portal was developed to provide applicants with clear information on the progress of their application, the ability to update details and upload documents, and the ability to communicate effectively.
Benefits
Efficiency
Annual efficiency: 353 bursary applications have been processed using the online form since Oct 2014 (that’s compared to 240 manually processed the previous year). Staff can process bursary applications in a more efficient and sustainable way. Thanks to the integration with the Student Record system, assessment of applications is conducted using more up-to-date admissions data and staffs are able to produce more accurate strategic and budgetary reporting.
Applicant portal provides clear and timely information more effectively to applicants. Enquiries are managed quickly and effectively. 10,882 decisions were made since the software went live in May 2015. It includes5,326 processed fromthe start of the application to the decision madeusing the new tools. / Recruitment and Admissions
Direct Admissions enhance the applicant experience and our communication; enhance the staff experience working with EUCLID; enhance the support for direct applicants and referees.
This provides staff with tools to support the delivery of quick and accurate decisions in line with Admissions Policy to support the achievement of recruitment targets. / What’s next
Scholarships: develop the tools to manage the processing, allocation and communication of scholarships in EUCLID.
Admission: rebuild the direct application form,
which include Other Admissions (i.e. where
staffs have to enter the application on behalf
of the students), this will end manual keying.
- Enhancing Student Support
What has been delivered
Postgraduate Research Students Annual Review form.Students, supervisors and administrators from all schools can use the Annual Review to fill in and sign off the form online for new and continuing PGR students.
IT Tool to record engagement against a student record: Engagement & Monitoring tools rolled out for both Tier 4 and non-Tier 4 students.
Benefits
Efficiency
The annual review process for PGR students has moved from paper to online, making the process clearer.
The University is compliant with UKVI. The engagement for all Tier 4 students, which the university sponsors, are now recorded directly by staff and information is held centrally.
The attendance and engagement monitoring has been extended to all HSS students: tutors can easily record attendance in small teaching groups directly into EUCLID using a phone or a tablet. This means that administration staffs no longer have to upload spreadsheets of attendance. / Student Experience
There has been increased visibility thanks to the PGR form: students and staff know they have to complete the annual review form. There are benefits in terms of data that comes out the system: we know what is happening with our PhD students in terms of progression. / What’s next
Redesigning the student hub in EUCLID: this will improve the usability and make it more scalable for the future.
Move the Postgraduate Progression Management Database(PPMD) functionality into EUCLID. This will reduce the amount of time being spent by the business users in maintaining data in two systems and will deliver a consolidated view for a student.
Review the Personal Tutor tool and the data made available, how it can be used to support schools office.
- Programme and Course Information (PCIM)
What has been delivered
Enhancements to Path for students: most popular courses and pre-selection for optional courses.
Course descriptor: improvement to the quality of the Course Descriptor informationand the course proposal process for staff.
Benefits
Efficiency
Course information is of higher standards and clearer for students.
Since the Course amendment went live, the increase of usage in the screens does show that the changes and accompanying policy changes in PCIM have resulted in more engagement from staff across the institution:
-1018 courses were closed in totalcompared with 376 last year. Note this is higher as there was a drive to close courses not intended to be delivered (including 514 which had no enrolments).
-Number of times the amend screens have been accessed this year: 26920 (Jan-Aug 2015), was 17929 over the same period in 2014:increase 50%.
-Courses that have had an 'Update':7173 (Jan-Aug 2015), 5899 over the same period in 2014:increase22%
-Number of staff that have amended a course:
639 (Jan-Aug 2015), 423 over the same period in 2014: increase 51%
-Number of academic staff that have amended a course:308(Jan-Aug 2015), 118 over the same period in 2014:increase 161% / Student Experience
A standard part of the initial meeting between a student and their Personal Tutor (PT) is to discuss course options. When a programme has lots of course choice this action can take up much of the allocated time between a tutor and tutee. Providing the facility for students in Path to select and submit provisional courses choices to the PT both encourages the student to take control of their curriculum and reduce the time spent on explaining the programme options to each student.
The PT will be able to review before the 1st meeting of term. As a result their 1st PT meeting will be more productive. / What’s next
Using the lessons learned from Path, develop access to course information for pre-applicants and enquirers.
Continue working with schools to enhance the course descriptor.
- Enquiry Management
What has been delivered
No project work this year in addition to last year FAQ installation integrated into the university website.
Benefits
Efficiency
The total number of visits to questions has been over32,300 hits to FAQ since May 2014. / Student Experience
Integration of the FAQ into the university website to achieve the best possible user experience. / What’s next
Evaluation of the FAQ and the expected reduction in the number of e-mails/queries about the areas, which have been targeted. This will decide whether to progress with a comprehensive web based solution to effectively manage applicants and student enquiries across the University.
This area needsto be addressed both from the management of enquiries and also the escalation of areas where notes are held on applicants and students. Opportunity to simplify some of this.
.
- Quality Hub and Management Information/Business Intelligence (strands merged)
What has been delivered
The External Examiners online reporting tool is used by the whole university. The External Examiner records are maintained in EUCLID.
There have been a number of important MI/BI developments including direct applications reports; progression reports; engagement reports, external examiners reports and significant continuous improvement activity (like the Key Information Set data are now available within BI so it is available across the institution). In addition engagement with the MIBI Strategy and Project and engaging in community.
Benefits
Student Experience
- The External Examiner online reporting and new process willmake a positive impact by implementing best practice based on feedback from external examiners.
The potential administrative savings from the External Examiner tool include a reduction in work required to gather and manage the external examiners reports in a consistent manner and reporting at an Institutional level.At mid-August 2015, 357 UG online reports have been sent to External Examiners, and 217 returned to be addressed by academic staff. / Compliance
- This will inform the University's strategic direction to quality assurance. The University can demonstrate to stakeholders it is compliant by scrupulously using the External Examiners’ reports to extract strategic themes.
Enhanced use of student data, including dashboards to help enhance learning & teaching, the overall student experience and operational efficiency.
- Compliance
What has been delivered
Current version of SITS is being used. Delivery of Statutory Returns including annual amendments and alterations. Removal of data from the student systemis now managed as business as usual.EUCLID/EUGEX databases are now on the new IS infrastructure.
Benefits
Efficiency
Following the migration to the new database infrastructure we have seen the refresh of EUGEX information set complete consistently in under 30 minutes (previously at worst over 1.5 hours). Downstream systems and reporting will see information consistently one hour behind EUCLID. / Compliance
SITS software is brought within the standard maintenance contract with our supplier Tribal, so that it remains fully supported and new features are available. Statutory reporting requirements are met so as to enable funding for the University. Compliance with annual Data Protection. / What’s next
Thanks to the new infrastructure, we can review the integration strategy for accessing student data for reporting and downstream systems, and looking at optimising the system architecture.
- Continuous Improvements
What has been delivered
Over the last 12 months, and responding to demands from users, the Student Systems Partnership have allocated resources to small scale enhancements and changes which support user’s needs, rather than focussing only on larger projects. Particularly important for post-implementation issues and enhancing existing processes and use of systems.
Benefits
Efficiency
Improvements were delivered benefiting schools, students and the SSP development team. They included:
- Awards and Marks upload: improved upload process performance and enhancements required for a successful run during exam boards.
-A solution is managing the University's accreditation responsibilities.
- Students are now allocated a new exam number rather than keeping the original.
- Reduction in the number of manual corrections by staffs that follow post roll forward.
- Reduction in the processing time required by support staff to clear potential duplicates.
- The CAS Confirmation of Acceptance for Studies creation can be centralised in Student Administration.
-New email domain names can be stored in EUCLID.
-Improved technical standards within the SSP development team, this will increase consistency and efficiency within the team. / What’s next
Working closely with Student Systems Operations and Schools, the15/16 Continuous improvements will prioritise enhancements benefiting the student experience.
Student Systems Partnership- End of Year Report for 2014/15
Programme Budget (Start of Year)- IS Apps days / 2,220Project Days Delivered / 2,451
Project Days Delivered vs Budget / 110%
Projects To Complete (Start of Year)1 / 10
Projects Delivered / 10
Projects Withdrawn / 1
In Year Projects / 2
Project Completion Rate (Excluding Withdrawn and In Year Projects) / 100%
1 Projects to complete excludes the multi-year projects (Assessment, SITS infrastructure Upgrade, Statutory Returns). It includes 3 projects delivered in 14/15 but not closed (Engagement Monitoring, Direct Admissions and Data Retention). The 1st two have now been closed. No further work is planned for the Data Retention project, due to close in Sept.
Franck Bergeret,
SSP Programme Manager, IS Apps Project Services,
September 2015