Clients - SAIT
Banner CAPP Module Satisfies Learners’ Desire for Access and Choice
Most learners at Southern Alberta Institute of Technology—with an average age of 27—have a good idea of what they want. And they’ve told the institute that they want some control over how they will achieve their goals.
"Students told us they wanted to handle more administrative activities on their own—not just learning—and they wanted choices of delivery, just like with curriculum," said Floyd Visser, Project Manager, Customer Service Process Development at SAIT.
One application that suits students’ needs is SunGard Higher Education’s Curriculum, Advising, and Program Planning
(CAPP) application within Banner Student. This module is a comprehensive tool that offers flexible student tracking toward a degree, certificate, or diploma. CAPP helps users, whether students or faculty, navigate through sometimes complex and diverse course requirements, giving them the ability to comprehensively track a student’s progress toward a goal.
SAIT encoded and tested its calendar for its 70 grant programs within a record three weeks. Now, staff and students are accessing CAPP’s compliance process online, getting results consistently within 3 to 10 seconds.
"Learners can go online, run CAPP compliance, and see where they are in a matter of seconds," said Gerald Arndt, Team Leader, Customer Services, Statistics and Program Setup at SAIT. Arndt. Previously, students would have to visit the Registrar’s office to obtain this information. Once the student was there, a staff member would dig through paper-based files and review the information. If the student had been absent from SAIT for a period of time, it was likely that programs had changed. Then, the staff member would need to review outdated calendars and make some comparisons and calculations to determine the student’s current standing.
Today, CAPP captures changes over time and can quickly evaluate the correct set of requirements if changes have occurred. "You can maintain the history of what a program looked like," said Sandra Risebrough, Project Facilitator, Customer Service Process Development, at SAIT. "The application knows the student’s effective term—when the student started initially with SAIT—and runs the program against that particular term."
Students still have the option of meeting with advisors who use the same tool to better counsel the students. With CAPP, advisors can spend a matter of minutes, rather than hours, plotting out a student’s progress toward degree completion. Or students can call the Registrar’s office where staff will have the information online at their fingertips. "Once the staff completed training on CAPP, they could make it do anything they want," said Arndt. "It’s a very nice system."
In the future, "what if" processing will be available online for effective, real-time student advising. Using this application, students or advisors will be able to answer commonplace questions like, "What will it take for me to graduate? Am I on schedule? And what if I were to change my major?"
"The CAPP application supports our emerging learners," said Floyd. "We have a lot of corporate clients who are looking for a skill set, not a degree. They want to know the courses they need to take to reach a desired end and whether it’s feasible for them to take them. Our customer service goal is to serve the customer on the first attempt, no matter which way the service is delivered."