Student Information System component phase-in gearing up for fall semester

By Gregory Moore

Implementation of significant components of the new Student Information System (SIS) will be rolled out during the next 18 months at Indiana University, with a goal of completing the project by December 2004.

After years of planning and preparation, remaining components of SIS, a new university-wide computing environment for student administration at IU, will begin being implemented during fall semester.

Comprised of PeopleSoft student administration software, a self-service environment and the IU Information Environment (IUIE) for reporting, the new system addresses such key functions as student recruitment, admissions, records, registration, grades, transcripts, advising, financial aid, student accounts (bursar), and data analysis and reporting of student-related information.

 

Materials outlining SIS activities will be distributed as implementation begins to impact IU campuses, schools, departments, staff, faculty and students.

The initial implementation phases for the SIS dealt with tracking prospective students and admissions processing and was implemented in October 2001. The phase-in of remaining SIS components will follow the academic calendar and will convert all existing student records.

Benefits

The SIS will enable IU to streamline operations and redesign processes to take advantage of best practices, providing an information environment for academic and administrative decision-making with integrated data, along with the tools for analysis, reporting and extraction. Additionally, the new system will employ improved technical infrastructure.

During the implementation period, the SIS Project Team plans to roll out self-service features alongside their associated administrative counterparts. Functionality that is available today in insite and other online services will be available in the new environment, along with new services. These services will be available in the OneStart Web portal (http://onestart.iu.edu). SIS will continue to provide a secure computing environment with a consistent look, feel and navigation scheme among the services provided.

A new version of Web registration will be introduced, and Web-based fee payment will be added. Touchtone services, which have seen a marked decline in use with the advent of Web-based services, will be retired.

Changes

Departmental systems, which presently house student data from the current system (IUIS), will be changed to accommodate the new data structures and coding values that will be introduced with the implementation of SIS. For example, the Social Security number (SSN) will no longer be the key field in the new system. It will be replaced with the new university ID as the system key (or primary student identifier). Assistance and training on how to change reports to use the new IUIE will be made available through training opportunities and documentation.

Specific communication as well as future training sessions will extensively cover the many changes related to processes and terminology utilized by the IU community

As new functionality in SIS is implemented, legacy systems will not be updated or enhanced for new activities; associated functions in the legacy system will be retired. In order to avoid building temporary and complicated interfaces between the two systems, there may be some need for dual data entry for a short period of time. The SIS Project Team and campus LITs (Local Implementation Teams) are working closely to provide a smooth transition.

Training and information

Initial training efforts began in April for targeted audiences; training activity will occur through October 2004. Formal training and assistance will be available throughout the transition, and specific information about training will be provided to affected audiences in the months ahead.

Materials outlining SIS activities will be distributed as implementation begins to impact campuses, schools, departments, staff, faculty and students. Additional ongoing communications are also planned to keep the university informed.

For a general implementation timeline, see: http://www.indiana.edu/~hrsis/sis_docs/052903_SIS_timeline.pdf

More detailed project information can be found at the SIS Web site: http://www.indiana.edu/~hrsis/