Introduction

The academic advising and course planning processes are a key component to students' retention and completing their degrees on time.

Challenges

• Students may change majors or degree programs multiple times.
• Out of the classroom work may count toward academic progress, but only in unique situations.
• It may take several in-person conversations with an academic advisor for a student to make a change.

Solutions

• Track any requested change with a unique submission to keep records separate and document the transition timeline. 
• Build a workflow with required information the student must submit, as well as a multistep approval process. 
• Summarize action items from in-person meetings in a standardized form, and use progress reports to check-in regularly.

Tips

• Use a data feed to seamlessly bring student information (e.g., from Banner or other CRM) into the platform.
• Ask for reference letters from faculty members, coaches, or other staff members to give a more holistic view of the student.
• Include policies and procedures about the institution's official major change process in the acknowledgement section.
• Set up separate routing steps for the student's academic advisor and the registrar. Use Applicant-Driven Routing Steps to make the process even quicker.
• To approve extracurricular activities for course credit (e.g., studying abroad), gather the initial information well in advance, and then use progress reports to collect information on learning outcomes later.
• Pull data on a specific student to show any/all submissions over time from the Reports tab > Applications reports.

Have more questions about this topic? Go to the Community Forum to pose the question to other users or submit a support ticket to InfoReady.