The Course Information System (CIS) is kicking off the New Year with a new look and feel – ready to save U of T faculty and administrators hundreds of hours of work.

After three months of usability testing and a survey conducted in early December 2018, CIS will display a redesigned homepage and other functional screens starting March 2019.

CIS was first developed with essential functionality for select units. Now it has been redesigned for a further expansion of its features and a broader user base, including new academic units across U of T. It streamlines syllabi and exams processes for instructors and administrators.

“CIS was initially designed to address some essential business needs. It served that purpose fairly well, but it’s also a living, breathing product that we envisioned as growing to support additional processes,” says Mike Clark, manager of user experience and process design with Enterprise Applications & Solutions Integration (EASI). “We’re now at a point where it makes sense to update the major aspects of the system’s design to accommodate those changes, and continue to afford a successful user experience.”

The system, created by EASI in partnership with the Office of the Vice-Provost, Innovations in Undergraduate Education, is currently being piloted in three divisions on two campuses. It is divided into three modules for instructors to submit syllabi-related materials, pre-exam and final exam details.

“CIS is beginning to reach its full potential in how faculty and staff not only administer courses, but also how it will streamline business processes,” says Julian Weinrib, director of the Office of the Vice-Provost, Innovations in Undergraduate Education. “We’ve built a strong foundation for the system and the design updates are a big step that will signal its growth.”

To create the redesign, the EASI user experience and process design team conducted extensive one-on-one interviews and usability tests followed by a survey sent to all CIS users. The survey asked users to vote on the three different options by ranking them overall, critiquing specific aspects of each concept, and inviting optional long-form qualitative feedback on what respondents thought of each concept.

One option featured the task areas in CIS.

---

Another option featured a tab-based navigation with courses at the forefront.

---

“We employed our user-centred methodology to figure out which of these options would be most intuitive and usable to the end users,” says Sydney Jia, a user experience researcher with EASI. “We had 85 respondents and were happy with the results, especially because many users provided detailed responses.”

At the end of the extensive research process, users preferred the option with tabs in the navigation and a workflow based on their courses.

The final, preferred option, featured a different tab design with courses at the forefront. 

---

“It’s important to have this input,” says Jia. “This is a way for users to be genuinely part of the process early on and we can shape the system for their needs. We’re helping to facilitate the best solution for them.”

After receiving and analyzing all of the feedback, the team then integrated it into an improved final design.

The simple design indicates the statuses of an instructor’s course content and what actions are required.

---

What’s next for CIS?

In the future, two more undergraduate divisions will be onboarded to the system in summer 2019. The team will also focus on developing an administrative interface to allow divisions to manage their own data within the system.

“As the system evolves, we will be conducting future research activities to ensure users are getting the best experience possible,” says Clark. “We invite anyone who would like to participate in the process to reach out to us – the feedback is invaluable.”

If you are a faculty or staff member who has feedback regarding CIS, please contact cis.help@utoronto.ca

Applying for programs can be a stressful experience for many students – from writing personal statements to requesting references to hoping for good news. Now, U of T has simplified one part of the process for admitted students, and will soon allow them to pay program admission deposits online.

In the past, students had to mail their admission deposit forms along with deposits in the form of a Canadian dollar bank draft. Starting in spring 2019, students will be able to pay their admission deposits through ACORN anywhere in the world where VISA or Mastercard are accepted.

“Students had to get a bank draft, put it in the mail and wait for it to be received and processed by Student Accounts,” says Audrey Cheung, manager of Student Accounts. “The whole time they’re wondering whether the money has been received and whether their spot in the program is secured.”

The new process will allow students to immediately view a record of their transaction and they will receive a confirmation email. The feature was completed on December 6, 2018, and will appear for those who owe an admissions deposit under the “Finances” section of ACORN.

“We wanted to ensure that this feature would be usable by all divisions, and the natural choice was to build it in ACORN,” says David Lock, information systems analyst with Enterprise Applications and Solutions Integration. “It’s important to give students convenient payment options so we can support U of T’s recruitment and admissions efforts.”

Programs use non-refundable deposits, credited against future tuition, to encourage students to make a commitment. Deposits also help enrolment staff plan ahead for incoming classes.

At the moment, 19 graduate units and two professional programs require incoming students to make a deposit as a condition of accepting an offer. In the future, international students in participating first-entry undergraduate programs will be required to pay deposits.

“The School of Graduate Studies has a distributed model, so different units have different business processes and deadlines,” says Josie Lalonde, director of student academic services at the School of Graduate Studies. “It’s important to offer a convenient solution to students, and this will ideally translate into students accepting their offers of admission.”

For the convenience of the service, students pay a 1.75 per cent processing fee to the payment provider, and they continue to have the option to pay by bank draft.

The team at EASI worked closely with Student Accounts, Enrolment Services and the School of Graduate Studies to determine their needs.

“This was a very consultative process. We worked with the team at EASI to come up with a solution that would work for everyone,” says Lalonde. “We were working with an aggressive timeline, and we’re happy with the results.”

The new functionality is expected to be activated by participating divisions in time for the first batch of international acceptances. Admitted students will see the notice upon logging into ACORN.

“We’re excited about offering this new functionality to incoming students, providing a new option for making the deposit that will hopefully bring a little more peace of mind,” says Lock. “Hopefully a more streamlined process for the academic divisions will help them continue to recruit and retain top students from around the world.”

It’s been over two months since U of T completed a three-year project to upgrade its student information system. After converting millions of lines of code and replacing an aging server, where does U of T stand and how will the system fare in the future?

The project, launched on November 19, 2018, was one of the largest of its kind to be undertaken at U of T. The success of the project relied heavily on a collaborative effort between Enterprise Applications & Solutions Integration (EASI), Enterprise Infrastructure Solutions (EIS), and Information Security.

“This project was truly monumental,” says Frank Boshoff, senior manager, technical solutions and architecture with EASI. “In the past, our server would be at full capacity during the first two weeks of January. After the transition to the new system, our servers are at 30 per cent capacity, and after more fine tuning this will translate into faster processing in the future.”

The system metrics indicate that students are accomplishing more work in less time with less aggravation. Server use is significantly lower and the bounce rate has dropped by 82 per cent. As a result, most students are accessing the application successfully and navigating to the information they need.

Boshoff predicts that the system will be ready for peak enrolment in July, and will be able to handle 9,000 concurrent users compared to the previous 700.  The new platform will also open up the potential for live integration with divisional systems, and ensure U of T stays at the forefront of technological innovation.

Before launching the platform, the project team conducted 3,657 test cases with a 98.6 per cent success rate. And after the cutover to the new system, thousands of users put it to the test.

“We were happy to see that there were only three regular users who enquired about how to log into the new system. It showed that our change management processes worked well since it was a smooth transition for most users,” says Cathy Eberts, executive director of EASI. “I want to emphasize how important it was to have participation from the divisions – a change like this couldn’t happen without massive support.”

To prepare staff and students for the change, EASI provided information for general awareness, training and support through a website, email updates, articles and social media. The project team also hosted 37 divisional meetings, four technical forums and conducted extensive user acceptance testing with over 200 participants and 500 test cases.

Testers from all divisions found 45 issues, or bugs, with the system. Each week EASI selected a winner for a gift card draw for those who had found issues.

“The user acceptance testing and training process was very straightforward,” says Mari Motrich, responsible for systems and data analysis at the Office of the Registrar, University of Toronto Scarborough. “We received a list of screens to test, and as a team we collected feedback and identified bugs. We also had two training sessions that were really useful – users reported bugs and also learned how to use the new ROSI. Overall, the testing, training and rollout of the project were smooth.”

As with most large technology projects, there are often issues that arise after going live with a new system.

“From November 19 through December we had daily stand-up meetings where we would assess and prioritize issues arising from the project,” says Rodney Branch, manager of client services and process integration at EASI. “During the first week of January, we had a high volume with course changes, student timetable lookups and class lists and reports, and the system performed remarkably well. We’ll continue to address additional issues as they arise and we appreciate users’ patience.”

The next phase of the project will involve developing the Data Decision Support System, which will be a near real-time copy of the ROSI data. It will allow staff to perform operational and analytical reports more quickly during peak registration periods. ACORN will also perform faster for students as they no longer need to compete with administrative staff for processing power.

“Overall, we’re very happy with how this project was rolled out,” says Eberts. “We’re setting the stage for technological innovation and ensuring that we have a platform in place upon which we can build and integrate new services.”

Thank you to all of our user acceptance testers, divisional users and the main project team who helped make this project a success.

As an application that is used by all 13 U of T residences, StarRez has streamlined the residence process for thousands of students – from the application process to deposits, room assignments and maintenance.

On November 7, StarRez users came together to discover best practices, tips and tricks, and to discuss process improvements. The event, called International StarRez Regional Connect, was the first conference of its kind hosted outside of the US, and welcomed close to 70 users and 12 institutions.

“The goal for this day was to provide an opportunity to connect and learn from colleagues at other local StarRez institutions, and it did not disappoint,” says Jen Radley, manager of U of T’s Housing Services. “This event helped facilitate conversations around industry trends and best practices, as well as networking with other StarRez users. It was a great opportunity for collaboration and conversation!”

U of T’s Student Family Housing implemented StarRez in 2007 with the help of Enterprise Applications and Solutions Integration (EASI), and a year later Chestnut Residence and Victoria College residence launched the residence admissions platform.

Now a university-wide application, U of T uses 22 modules and manages more than 28 residence applications. StarRez is also used to manage maintenance and facilities, residence life activities, and conference and events services at various campuses/residences.

“Over the past six years, the process of setting up and transitioning U of T’s residence management portal from the StarRez desktop client to a web portal has been an incredibly collaborative and community building effort,” says Vik Chadalawada, senior manager of student information systems with EASI. “Yet another fine enterprise example of how technology when combined with people and process is a winning formula for service adoption.”

In a broader sense, StarRez has over 600 customers in 15 countries, supporting more than 1.5 million residents.

“The U of T residence community is quite collaborative, but also diverse. This event enabled us to connect with other institutions that shared issues that were unique to individual residences at U of T,” says Arlene Clement, director of Housing Services.

Next steps for the project include developing a new portal, called Portal X, that will provide an enhanced and streamlined residence application portal across the university.

“Since this year’s event was so successful, we look forward to continuing these conversations in the future,” says Radley. “Peer-to-peer learning is so important and it really helps to hear from others who are facing similar challenges and who need to remain current with trends in the housing industry. Stay tuned for details about next year’s event!”

After three years of intense preparation, the success of the Platform Modernization Project came down to one weekend. Led by Next Generation Student Information Services (NGSIS), the project involved converting over 2 million lines of code and replacing an aging server. The new platform will modernize U of T’s student information system for years to come.

From November 16 to 19, teams from Enterprise Applications & Solutions Integration (EASI), Enterprise Infrastructure Solutions (EIS), and Information Security worked around the clock to ensure a smooth cutover to the new system.

The support team attends a pre-cutover planning meeting (photo by Sarosh Jamal)

“A project with a ‘hard’ cutover – meaning all-or-nothing – requires a talented and motivated cross-functional team,” says Frank Boshoff, senior manager, technical solutions and architecture with Enterprise Applications and Solutions Integration (EASI). “The results speak for themselves. In a single weekend, ROSI changed from being a legacy mainframe application with roots in the mid-1970’s, to an Internet-savvy application with some modern smarts.”

In the future, 15,000 students will be able to use the system via ACORN simultaneously, versus the current 700. The new platform will also open up the potential for live integration with divisional systems, and ensure U of T stays at the forefront of technological innovation.

How did the team pull off such a large-scale project?

“A project of this size requires many talented resources, not only from EASI, but also from across Information Technology Services departments, and support from our user community has been phenomenal,” says Cathy Eberts, executive director of EASI. “Many of our divisional colleagues participated in the user acceptance testing and in implementing a number of new products.”

The core team celebrates after the successful cutover (photo by Sarosh Jamal)

The next phase of the project will involve developing the Data Decision Support System, which will be a near real-time copy of the ROSI data. It will allow staff to perform operational and analytical reports more quickly during peak registration periods. ACORN will also perform faster for students as they no longer need to compete with administrative staff for processing power.

“Now we can begin to integrate ROSI with other systems, within ITS and the divisions, to better meet academic and administrative needs,” says Boshoff. “The Data Decision Support System is part of this process, offering improved security and helping staff to work more efficiently. We’re excited for the future!”

Thank you to all of our user acceptance testers, divisional users and the main project team who helped make this project a success.

Project team:

Hossein Aliabadi	Gerry Lindo
Dharmesh Amalsadia	Paul Littlefield
Diana Augustin	Robert Liu
Diana Avon	David Lock
Katie Babcock	Mezba Mahtab
John Bassani	Sinisa Markovic
Joe Bate	Sue Mcglashan
Christine Beckermann	Philip Millenaar
Donald Boere	Evan Moir
Brenda Boshoff	Wei-hua (Walter)Ni
Frank Boshoff	Michael O’Cleirigh
Rod Branch	Jose Parada
Cidalia Carreiro	Andrey Pletnev
Kun Chai	Dana Pogaceanu
Kim Chan	Haroon Rafique
June Cheng	Ted Sikorski
Magdelene Cheung	Pete St Onge
Richard Chow	Petru Sugar
Hung Chu	Joanne Sukhai
Alex Dault	Alex Tchakhamakhtchian
Paul Day	Blair Thompson
Cris Diaconu	Ken Tsang
Miki Harmath	Luzinda Van Huyssteen
Matthew Hendrickson	Parani Vinayagamoorthy
Titus Hsu	Amanda Werkhaizer
Sarosh Jamal	Gaye Wignall
Kelly Jay	Laurel Williams
Sydney Jia	Zoe Wong
Andre Kalamandeen	Mike Wyers
Laura Klamot	David Yin
Anton Kruger	Bruce Zhu
Nicky Lai

Congratulations to staff members from Enterprise Applications & Solutions Integration (EASI) and the Planning & Budget Office for winning three U of T Excellence Through Innovation Awards (ETIA).

These awards recognize the contributions of administrative staff in advancing the University’s strategic objectives, encouraging administrative innovation, and providing a platform for sharing best practices. ETIA is an opportunity to celebrate improved practices within every area of our work and to let the employees know how significant their contributions are.

Alumni Impact Survey – EASI

One of the most extensive studies of its kind at U of T and in Canada, the Alumni Impact Survey (AIS) provides for the first-time comprehensive data on the economic, social and cultural impact of U of T’s community of more than 540,000 graduates around the globe. President Meric Gertler served as executive sponsor of the study, while David Palmer, Vice President Advancement, Vivek Goel, Vice President Research and Innovation, and David Estok, Vice-President Communications took charge of delivering on its mandate.

Recipients:

Althea Blackburn-Evans
Deborah Buehler
Gwenyth Burrows
Mary Ellen Caskenette
Vikram Chadalawada
Chuck Chan
Anne Marie Cobban
David Curtin
Barbara J. Dick
Allison Dubarry
Humberto C. Ferreira
Susan D. Fischer
Anthony Gray
Matthew A. Hendrickson
John Hermans
Richard C. Kellar
Tanya Kreinin
Helen Lasthiotakis
Jonathan Leitch
Kimberly Teresa Lyn
Leonard McKee
Bruce W. Mitchell
Milla Motrich
Emma Nguyen
Stephannie Roy
Caley Tessier
Richard Whittall

Data Dragons Competition – EASI and Planning & Budget

On July 5, EASI and Planning & Budget welcomed over 120 attendees to watch U of T’s first Data Dragons Competition. Six dragons critiqued five data science and business intelligence presentations, and questioned participants about University-wide impact, proof of concept and stakeholder involvement. The winning proposal is being sponsored by EASI and Planning & Budget.

Recipients:

Andrea Armstrong
Judith Chadwick
Anita Chooraman
Cathy Eberts
Michael Green
Robert Jordan
Heather Kelly
Richard Levin
Joseph Peter McNamara
Mari Motrich
Paul Nakonechny
Trevor Rodgers

---

Creating an Institution-Wide Data Community – EASI and Planning & Budget

The goal of this project was to create an institution-wide data community to help administrators save time, more easily analyze data and make effective, data-driven decisions.

The EASI and Planning & Budget team hosted community events on the St. George and UTSC campuses, which featured a broad range of speakers including those from the Faculty of Arts & Science, Financial Services, UTSC Registrar’s Office, Research & Innovation, and the Map & Data Library.

They also created a virtual community using online collaboration tools and featuring a website, newsletters, and a group email data@utoronto.ca. The team also hosts meetings for Tableau user groups for public sector workers across Ontario, and training for U of T staff.

Recipients:

Alexandra Agostino
Diana Avon
Christine Beckermann
Brenda Boshoff
Yuliya Cherevko
Andy Chien
Michael Green
Robert Jordan
Anton Kruger
Xiaoming Liang
Kelly Raposo
Louise Tardif

U of T has just announced the beginning of a multi-year project to help students easily search and apply for awards. The new system will automatically match students to relevant awards and notify them about funding decisions, amounts and payment dates.

Not only will this platform increase transparency and efficiency, but it will also help U of T maintain its standing as one of the world’s leading universities.

“Currently, students need to search for awards on their departmental, faculty and college websites, and also be aware of centrally funded awards,” says Donna Wall, director of financial aid and awards at Enrolment Services. “This platform will increase transparency and efficiency for applicants, recipients, donors and administrative staff.”

The project, a partnership between Enrolment Services and Enterprise Applications & Solutions Integration (EASI), will consolidate information and streamline manual processes for over 8,000 awards per year.

A key feature of the new system is its ability to automatically match students to awards according to their program, faculty, degree, GPA, and other award-specific criteria. The system will also store award letters for future reference and notify students about payment details.

A university-wide working group determined business needs, conducted interviews with other universities and attended multiple vendor demonstrations. After an extensive process, SmartSimple Software Inc. was announced as the chosen vendor on October 10, and implementation planning has begun.

“We’ve used a highly collaborative approach to select a vendor,” says Farah Ally, project manager with EASI. “U of T is a complex environment and currently the awards adjudication and administration processes for graduate and for undergraduate students have different requirements. It was important to find a solution that will best meet our combined needs and provide a solid foundation for the future.”

Staff will also be able to use an advanced search engine to match students with specific awards.

“Graduate students rely heavily on funding. We administer close to 4,000 awards per year,” says Laura Stathopoulos, director of Graduate Awards and Financial Aid with the School of Graduate Studies. “Because not all awards require an application, administrators will be able to automatically match eligible students to awards – we want to easily connect students with the right opportunities and help them reach their goals.”

Next steps for the project include launching the student facing awards search engine in spring of 2019. The team will then pilot the full system, including administrative functionality, with select faculties and colleges before rolling it out across the university.

“U of T is an affordable institution and we’re excited to advance the university’s mission,” says Wall. “This will transform awards administration for current and prospective students as well as staff.”

Multiple emails, hard copy printouts and a lot of time – this once described the process of creating a high-value purchase order (PO) at U of T. Now, new functionality in the Financial Information System (FIS) will allow staff at the St. George campus to create a PO at or above $25,000 without an FIS purchase requisition.

All related documentation is attached to the PO in the system, which is then automatically routed to Procurement Services for review and release. Staff can also track their PO status in real time and store all back-up documentation directly in the system.

“The previous system was cumbersome,” says Shauna Schwartz, Manager of Purchasing Services and Operations with Procurement Services. “It required users to email an FIS purchase requisition number and include multiple PDF, Excel and Word attachments. We’ve now removed these extra steps for the user. This is the first of many improvements over the next three years to modernize our systems.”

The project, which went live on August 1, was a combined effort between Enterprise Applications & Solutions Integration, Procurement Services and Financial Services.

The functionality was piloted with the Department of Chemistry, the Faculty of Dentistry, and Facilities and Services.

“The new system has some significant benefits,” says Usama Makary, Manager of Finance with the Department of Facilities and Services. “The most noteworthy is the fact that the system allows users to track their respective requests until final release is confirmed – all of this is completed electronically.”

In addition, the new process generates an automated email with a soft copy (PDF) of the PO, which can be forwarded to vendors.

“The value add and efficiencies realized from the new system are truly remarkable,” says Makary, who was part of the pilot group. “We’re witnessing a new achievement that will raise the bar of the quality of services provided and response time.”

Throughout the summer, the Financial Advisory Services and Training team offered five information and training sessions to more than 100 attendees.

In the future, the plan is to monitor the function with staff at the St. George campus and roll it out to the University of Toronto Mississauga and University of Toronto Scarborough.

“We’re excited about where this project will take us,” says Schwartz. “We want to improve processes and the customer experience, and also help staff save time and minimize risk. We’ll be looking at how to streamline other processes in the future.”

How does a division reduce 1,700 digital documents to 372 and create an efficient information management process for the future? U of T’s Division of Human Resources & Equity (HR&E) did just that with the help of SharePoint Online and Enterprise Applications & Solutions Integration (EASI).

In July 2018, the new HR&E Documents Hub replaced the Blackboard portal. The new site allows staff to track, modify, store, organize and share critical documents.

“Blackboard provided us with a secure place to store documents, but it was difficult for staff to search for information,” says Hayley Fuller, communications and change manager with HR&E. “We have a lot of documents that we produce centrally that we need to distribute to divisional offices. SharePoint Online offers comprehensive search, document versioning capabilities and a mobile-ready interface for an enriched user experience.”

The HR&E and EASI teams centralized forms, templates, procedures and policies. They created an overall strategy, extracted the content from Blackboard and analyzed which documents out of thousands should be transferred to SharePoint Online. They then customized the user interface with feedback from focus groups, and created a process for removing stale information in the future.

“We wanted to make SharePoint Online a much better user experience,” says Heather Postill, information management analyst with Enterprise Applications & Solutions Integration (EASI). “It’s important that documents are accurate and up to date, and we wanted to save HR practitioners time when searching for the basics.”

Tamsyn Boshoff, compensation advisor with HR&E, is a content manager and was part of the planning and testing process.

“The testing process was thorough and the new system is really user friendly,” says Boshoff. “On the old system there was no way to know whether posted materials were being used. Now, we can see which documents are popular and users can sign up to get notifications about updates.”

Along with HR&E, the EASI team has worked closely with the Bloomberg Faculty of Nursing, the Planning & Budget Office and the Office of the Vice-President, International to optimize their document management needs. Since launching SharePoint Online in January 2018, the EASI team has provisioned over 90 sites for divisions to use on their own and provided in-depth coaching and partnership with nearly half of those. Their consulting services are open to all areas of the university.

“We can help units and divisions with a more formal process, or we can provide ad hoc consultation – ultimately it’s about organizing information and improving business processes,” says Postill. “Beyond SharePoint, we can also offer consulting for other document management systems.”

This project represents phase one of a multi-year strategy to improve document management within HR&E. In the future, the division plans to work with all HR units to consolidate information and is also creating a hub for business officers.

“The EASI team has been such an incredible resource,” says Fuller. “We didn’t know what we didn’t know when we started this process. With their expertise, they guided us through every step and can do the same for any other area at the university.”

Interested in learning more about SharePoint Online and how to work with EASI? Check out the EASI Document Management Hub’s resource library, sign up for an LLC course or contact easi.sharepoint@utoronto.ca.