SCT Banner YES Implementation Team

Meeting Notes

MEETING LOGISTICS

Item / Description
Date / September 24, 2007
Time / 8:30 a.m.

Location

/ MESHEL HALL – Computer Center Conference Room

ATTENDEES

Facilitator(s) / Carol Chen
Note Taker / Cheryl Beil
Participants / Mary Lou Castner, Troy Cross, Sujit Das, Sue Davis, Donna Esterly, Becky Geltz, Jeanne Herman, Tim Kovaleski, Betty Jo Licata, Dona Madacsi, Rick Marsico, Elizabeth Nelson, James Stanger, Bob Tupaj, and Beth Yeatts.

Not Present

/ Eileen Greaf, Catherine Cala, Cindy Miller and Donna Wainio

AGENDA ITEMS

CORRECTIONS / Notes
Impl Mtg – 9/10/07
/ New Business item #5 corrected to read “XML transfers” rather than SML transfers. Email any other corrections to Cheryl Beil.
INTRODUCTION OF NEW IT STAFF
/ Carol introduced new technical staff including: Elizabeth Nelson, SA1 for FinAid and A/R support, and Tim Kovaleski, SA1 for Student support. Rick M. introduced Sujit Das, the new Technical Resource consultant for Banner who will assist Student and F/A system implementations. He has worked on Banner systems about 9½ yrs. beginning at Indiana State Univ., then as an independent Banner consultant, then for SunGard Collegis, and then back to independent Banner consulting. Donna E. recommended that the new staff review the CD of this year’s SunGard Summit for additional information about Banner.

REVIEW PRIOR ACTION ITEMS

/ See updates on items #1, #2, #3, #5a-b-c-d-e, and #10.

TEAM UPDATES

1.  Student
a. Regis/Record
/ Mock Registration is set for week of 10/1. Donna W. scheduled training sessions for faculty and advisors today. Encountered some issues last week; Tom M. is working to complete the Summer 2007 schedule and has reviewed the process for loads. Jeanne will check on status of outstanding tasks to determine if data can be ready in STMP for today’s training. Mock II will focus only on one term since we will only have time to adequately prepare data for Summer term at this point; will then do fall schedule and registration at a later date in permit parallel testing. New Student consultant Rob Woodyard will replace Lee Cipolla; he will be on campus the week of 10/8. Gaye Santoro assured Donna E. that Rob has skill sets very comparable to Lee; Donna reiterated that we do not want multiple consultants. Enlisted Gaye’s support in scheduling consultants in next few months; and agreed on a policy for payment for cancellation of services if within 2 weeks, with a goal of providing a 30-day notice when possible. Doug resolved a web problem with DARS; discovered a bug in software received from Miami Univ. Lyda Smith will be on campus during week of 10/1; will email her travel schedule. Jeanne emailed a decision document to Implementation Team; please review and forward comments to her.
b. Admissions
/ Sue Davis requested that Computer Services continue to run the discrepancy report between M-204 and Banner once a week on Monday morning. Currently are replacing the old legacy residency code of 4 on international student records in Banner for graduate and undergraduate; will instead use coding for in-state, out-of-state, and regional service area for billing purposes. Banner system identifies the legacy code 4 as non-Ohio residency instead of just a foreign student which bills at incorrect rates. Student team will research how Banner can identify a student as foreign for purposes of student health insurance, federal/state/HEI reporting, and awarding institutional aid; may require an attribute. Carol will contact Jef Davis (Intl Studies) re: maintaining SEVIS foreign student info. Carol reported that Jayne and Dennis have fixed 95% of data in STVSBGI; still have some duplicate records with 2 different IPED codes. Zip+4 county code issue will be addressed at next Gen Person Team meeting.
c. Student Accts
/ TouchNet kickoff conference call was held 9/12; Banner connectivity issue during demo was resolved after the software was installed by Troy and tested by Carol. Will hold a 2nd conference call on 9/27. Troy will begin work on installing Cashiering stations. Began working with Mary Noble to identify refund groups but changed focus to identify billing groups until more familiar with FinAid’s warning report process. Also working with Mary Lou on another refund check issue; received a response from UDC and will need clean instance before additional testing can be done. After Troy installs patches on PROD, Beth will request a clone to PPRD to try UDC recommendation. A/R has not had any consultant on-site since last fall to assist with several issues. Pat Kelley is scheduled for a virtual classroom session on 10/26, but Keith Miles is also trying to locate another consultant to come on campus prior to Pat’s visit set for 4/15-17 of 2008.
2.  Financial Aid / Loan guarantor Great Lakes will be on campus 9/25 to discuss loan issues; Beth Y. will also be involved. Visit to Miami of Ohio is set for 10/22-23 to discuss FinAid issues and share info with other Banner schools, including Kent State, Toledo, Wright State and Miami. Working to get PROD instance up to date; were able to automate the housing grant manual awarding process. James indicated that there is no immediate need to upgrade to release 7.9 but will need to have it in TEST to be able to test all processes. Wright State indicated that they have no script to process agency or 3rd party financial aid (i.e.- BVR, etc.). Beth Y. reported that YSU processes more 3rd party aid than most colleges and has more intricate fee payment scenarios; past assessments of pulling the function into A/R indicate that it would require additional staff resources and involve a duplication of effort. Past terms of agreement with donors are creative and are not necessarily compatible with system functionality, often requiring special processing procedures. James emailed the FinAid decision document to Impl Team for review; email any comments or suggestions to him so it can be finalized and forwarded to the Advisory Committee.
3.  General Person / No report given.
4.  HR/Payroll / No report given.
5.  MyYSU / Portal/website advisory committee met to discuss Classified Ads channel. Bob spoke with Denise Anderson (Wright State); they have used the Ads channel successfully for over 3 yrs. with about 150-250 ads posted. She monitors the channel about 15 minutes each day scanning the ads; their Help Desk also assists by notifying her of any violations (encountered very few issues over the 3-year period). The website advisory committee expressed some concerns and agreed to table the matter; if decide to move forward with the channel, will forward information gathered thus far to General Counsel for advisement. Both Wright State and U of Saskatchewan have a policy in their portal channel and are satisfied overall. Bob met with John Dalbec and other DBAs to discuss a process for pulling Faculty/Staff directory info out of Banner; consensus is that it should be possible – will submit a GMR to request IT assistance. Doug inquired about maintaining the campus phone extension field in SPRTELE; unless Telephone Services maintains the data, it cannot remain in synch with our 3rd party phone system. Have been forwarding Jason Rakers any changes made in stand-alone database to compare with Tele Services records. Carol suggested a workgroup meeting to communicate to Jason’s staff the need to update the Banner system when maintaining the Campus Directory. Donna E. reported that Jason is currently evaluating the capabilities of the present phone system and the lack of maintenance; Bob will discuss with him. James requested that a mock FinAid channel be set up in the portal TEST instance to test the link to the awards section and modifications. Carol asked Bob about the feedback on the WebCT single sign-on in the portal which has been running during Summer 2007 and Fall for faculty and students. Bob has tested and signed off on the Luminis 3.3 upgrade; John will do portal server maintenance this weekend.
6.  Finance / Still having problems with bank codes for student refund records; will request clone of PPRD this week. Requested that General Acctg create a new fund dedicated solely to student refunds; will be assigned proper bank code for refunds. Resumed work with Mary N. on HEI reporting; will verify with Michele H. if she still wants to keep the Nov. deadline to avoid manual processing. Mary Lou emailed Carol proposed dates for a consultant to come onsite to assist A/P and A/R with Student processing issues.
7.  Advancement / No report given.
8.  Communication / Will meet with Jeanne H. and Bob T. to develop a complete plan for communicating the Student implementation. Proposed doing an update in next newsletter to explain Student components for processing financial aid in new Banner system. Also suggested an article on the new process for faculty evaluation.
9.  ODS/EDW / WebFocus was upgraded in PROD to newest version. Reminded all areas to run existing WF queries in ODST to test new 3.1 update before moving it into PROD.
10.  Training / No report given.
11.  Technical / Troy will install 2 A/R patches and 1 Finance patch today, plus the Banner connect 2.6.2 for TouchNet. Mike Roberts will be sending Banner data base guardians a security audit detailing the classes owned and users currently granted access to the classes for verification and updating as needed; security officers can review list and notify guardians to revise or approve for signoff.
Troy expressed concern about how to get 3rd party systems in synch in PROD. Jamie reported the inconsistency of data guardian and security officer on the Banner Services Request form. It should be clarified.
NEW BUSINESS
None

ACTION ITEMS

New Action Items / Issues /

Owner

/

Due Date

/

Status

1. None / / /

Prior Items / Issues

/

Owner

/

Due Date

/

Current Status

1.  PABUG Conference
Nov. 19-20, 2007 – Grantville, PA /

Team Leaders

/ October
2007 / Doug Sewell and Bob Tupaj are planning to attend. Beth Yeatts is interested but will continue to watch website for sessions info.
2.  Banner upgrades for various systems /

Team Leaders

/ On-going / Troy distributed a matrix showing all Banner releases with Release version # and install date, plus any new releases currently available or forthcoming and availability dates (does not include 3rd party products). Recommends upgrading General to 7.4.1 in near future. UDC provides release notes.
3.  Review single sign-on PIN / password
guidelines related to FERPA issues /

General Person

/ ASAP / Greg Morgione (Gen Counsel) foresees no issue using an employee’s birth date and partial SS# for initial sign-on in portal since information is not made public.
4.  Decision document re: MyYSU email
addresses for alumni and current
graduates /

Catherine Cala

/ ASAP / Catherine, Bob, Donna and Carol met to discuss status of SS impl for Alumni & Friends plus possibility of using a permanent email addr for alumni. Will meet w/ Deans to discuss email options for grads incldg recom to award permanent emails only to Alumni Assoc members. Will draft decision doc & consider feasibility of conducting a survey of alumni/current grads to determine interest.
5.  Banner System & Third Party software –
a. Parking fees – Bosscars
b. Classroom/Events Management
Scheduling – Ad Astra
c. Faculty Evaluation
d. XML Transcript
e. HEI Reporting /

Carol Chen

/

In process

In process
In progress
In progress
In progress /

● Holding weekly conf calls with Bosscars consultant. Jason T. has installed all scripts received to date; wrote a modification to code file to permit building parking fees based on resident and non-resident status. Jason will apply the Bosscars patch to resolved issue of system assigning duplicate parking # when 2 different staff are entering data at same time. Lisa C. is working with Genl Acctg to create a report to run which will charge employee parking benefits back to each department.

● Waiting for 2007-08 schedule data to be loaded in STMP & imported into Ad Astra so team can set up more classroom preferences to test software. Events Mgmt is progressing with set up of validation rules.

**Carol emailed Impl Team regarding the Faculty Evaluation workgroup kickoff meeting notes held 9/10. Group is comprised of some HR staff, Jeanne H., Becky G., Carol and some faculty reps. Initial discussion concerned how students evaluate teaching and learning in M-204 compared to Banner process (paper v. online process). Next session is set for 10/15; invited an interested faculty member to present his ideas in person. Notes from their workgroup sessions are posted on YES website for Impl Team to read.
**Carol indicated that tentative plans are to implement the XML electronic transcript transfer process mandated by Ohio Board of Regents sometime after Student GoLive the end of March; continue to hold ongoing conference calls every other week with other Ohio Higher Ed public institutions. Based on our unique, complicated data history conversion of quarter to semester hours needed for Banner, Carol did some initial XML transcript setup in STMP and has successfully exported one test transcript from Banner to OBOR. For the importing process, Terry (Wright State) agreed to send a sample transcript to the OBOR website for Carol to download into our Banner server to test importing electronic transcript. The XML workgroup is planning to attend a workshop held by OBOR; session is scheduled for 11/5.
**Carol reported the HEI finance workteam is making slow progress due to year-end audit work currently underway. Discovered that much faculty load data needed for HEI HR reporting was not converted at HR/Payroll GoLive in Jan. 2007; recommends a regular bi-weekly meeting of workgroup. Carol will work with Kay Helscel (Facilities) and Mary to address Facilities HEI data requirements; HEI work team will meet again in October.
6.  Evaluate if WYSU should use Banner
Advancement for pledges /

Advancement Team