2014 AACRAO Annual
Life After Transcript Receipt: How to Maximize the Benefit of Electronic Transcripts Exchange
2014 AACRAO Annual Matt Bemis, University of Southern California Susan Dorsey, University of Colorado, Boulder
Presentation Overview
USC Case Study – Leveraging systems, standards and service providers to streamline data processing and improve services
Getting the most out of electronic transcripts transmissions
Automating your processing of student Test Score data
AP Exam data - What you need to know to process data efficiently
Creating electronic exchange partnerships with vendors
EDI transcripts exchange successes at USC
Automation of International Degree Verifications and transfer credit evaluation processing through successful vendor partnerships
Streamlining Overseas Studies transcripts processing
Taking the grunt work out of on-campus overseas studies transcript processing and reporting
EDI transcripts exchange successes at USC EDI
development timeline at USC
Began
mapping inbound EDI transactions in late 2009 as part of the EtranscriptCA efforts three weeks to go live in production – found the inbound effort very easy to configure with existing degree audit software application system.
Took
Thought
we were hot stuff with the ease of implementation.
EDI transcripts exchange successes at USC
What we learned as we broadened our base of EDI trading partners (i.e. Texas Server deliverables):
EDI acknowledgement transactions are necessary for most senders
Handling EDI data from district schools
Imaging EDI transactions to existing systems (in real time)
Handling prior degree information in EDI transactions
Mapping FICE, ACT, and CEEB data reliably
Data rendering interface for Advisor use
EDI transcripts exchange successes at USC
Other lessons learned with EDI transcripts:
Handling ‘Unknown’ student transcript transactions
Handling unexpected transactions (unknown CEEBs)
How to handle EDI data for students not yet admitted
Reporting ‘change of data’ instances for administrative review
The importance of weekly reporting of EDI receipt activity
Development and production of outbound USC EDI transcript transactions – a humbling experience.
EDI transcripts exchange successes at USC
Where we were, and how far we have come:
2010 -- 1474 inbound TS130 transactions received
2011 -- 2212 inbound TS130 transactions received
2012 -- 4287 inbound TS130 transactions received
2013 -- 5828 inbound TS130 transactions received
2014 (through March 1) – 3700 inbound TS130 transactions received What really has changed? Hassle free, hands free transfer credit evaluations for every EDI transcript received (almost).
Electronic data workflow at USC
Electronic data workflow at USC
Transcript Viewer Utility
Rendered TS130 Data, with additional data populated from SIS:
Weekly activity report – Very important!
Resources Available to You: http://speedeserver.org
AP Exam data processing ETS
service provider makes available encrypted file for download
Easy
to register and use key pairs for decryption of data
Records
matching/mapping and data management will be your challenge
AP Exam data processing at USC Lessons
learned in handling this data well:
Records
USC uses last name, first name, and date of birth Intentionally, SSN matching is not engaged
How
matching criteria:
to manage unmatched records
Process to ‘re-index’ records Necessary on records where data is transposed or ill formatted Handling records where multiple student IDs are matched Process to archive data that has been re-indexed or deleted from process file queue Creating ‘inquiry’ records for unmatched record IDs
Handling AP
error codes No AP exam file left unprocessed. Period.
Successful vendor partnerships
USC sought help with a major processing bottleneck: International degree verification.
Facts:
USC is the largest provider of postsecondary education to international students
Every graduate student must have a prior degree verification on file, as a condition of admission
Successful vendor partnerships
The Problem:
The registrar’s office assumed responsibility for this service but was not provided any staff with subject matter expertise
The learning curve associated with the evaluation and authentication of transcript and diploma documents
The incident of fraudulent transcripts and credentials for international documents
USC is the largest provider of postsecondary education to international students
Successful vendor partnerships
The Solution:
Changed business practices to outsource evaluation services
Made the decision to single source the third party service provider
Began early in the vendor selection the discussion of codevelopment of services to deliver evaluation results through established EDI and/or XML standards
Represented this co-development as a win-win for all parties involved – USC, the vendor, and students
Successful vendor partnerships
Where we are today
We LOVE our third party vendor, IERF!
Open to co-development of any area that would improve services Always accessible and responsive Very helpful in other areas of processing
Since going live in November 2013, more than 750 verifications have been processed successfully (will process 2000+ annually) Has removed a full FTE+ assignment from this service area Has greatly improved quality and consistency of the evaluation process Protects USC from fraudulent documents and other areas of exposure Rollout of EDI transmissions could have not gone more smoothly
Other successful vendor partnerships Co-development
of application program interface with CollegeSource: Developed
web services to aid in the transfer course evaluation workflow at USC, which included:
Real time retrieval of course data from TES through an API Web service that acts as a ‘rules builder’ for Transfer Articulation (TA) table updates Enhanced administrative controls to oversee the types of credit being added to Transfer Articulation (TA) tables. The elimination of manual key entry of TA rules. Since implementation in January 2013, more than 11,000 rules have been successfully inserted into TA tables. The majority of an FTE was repurposed upon launch of API
CollegeSource data for USC evaluation needs
Worksheet details – Required data
Summary of evaluation screen view
dd
Taking the overhead out of Overseas Studies workflow What worked for USC Facts:
More than 750 students participate in sponsored overseas studies programs annually
More than 100 study abroad programs are available to students
Overseas studies work is reported as course work taken ‘in residence’ and is included on the USC transcript
Most students complete between four (4) and six (6) courses a semester while studying abroad
Each course must be articulated to USC equivalent departments and course levels, and loaded into SIS
Taking the overhead out of Overseas Studies workflow What worked for USC What
Proof of concept #1: Could we reliably articulate and report overseas course work in existing Transfer Articulation systems without disrupting other transfer credit processing?
First 12 months was focused on this effort Overseas studies work appeared on the Transfer Credit Report (TCR), but was identified as “home” course work
Proof of concept #2: Could we reliably limit the program unit caps based on the overseas program being processed?
we set out to do:
Had to identify each program by unique code Degree Audit encoding had to be able to limit courses, to include splitting of unit credit for course work that ‘straddled’ a unit limit Reporting of ‘split credit’ had to be reliable
Proof of concept #3: Could we extract the data needed based on the TCR run and import that data into SIS?
Earned credit, failed credit, course grades, titles, and term data items Split credit would be the show stopper if not handled properly Had to design business rules to ensure evaluation results would not change over time
Taking the overhead out of Overseas Studies workflow What worked for USC Where
we are today… Big Win!
Took two years to arrive, but we are now processing all overseas work through our existing Transfer Credit systems Results of overseas studies course work writes to SIS in real time Results are available immediately and are reflected in SIS and the student’s Degree Audit Processing was decreased from 20 business days to two (2) days Evaluation results are standardized from cycle to cycle The manual scheduling of course sections, loading and grading of sections, and all other manual work was eliminated The manual loading of the work alone required 700 hours of staff time annually All students who attended a fall 2013 study abroad program have been successfully processed through this automated configuration
Overseas Studies – What students and Advisors see
View of processed courses on the Transfer Credit Report
View of the USC transcript detail on SIS
Questions?
Email: [email protected] [email protected]
2014 AACRAO Annual Matt Bemis, University of Southern California Susan Dorsey, University of Colorado, Boulder
Presentation Overview
USC Case Study – Leveraging systems, standards and service providers to streamline data processing and improve services
Getting the most out of electronic transcripts transmissions
Automating your processing of student Test Score data
AP Exam data - What you need to know to process data efficiently
Creating electronic exchange partnerships with vendors
EDI transcripts exchange successes at USC
Automation of International Degree Verifications and transfer credit evaluation processing through successful vendor partnerships
Streamlining Overseas Studies transcripts processing
Taking the grunt work out of on-campus overseas studies transcript processing and reporting
EDI transcripts exchange successes at USC EDI
development timeline at USC
Began
mapping inbound EDI transactions in late 2009 as part of the EtranscriptCA efforts three weeks to go live in production – found the inbound effort very easy to configure with existing degree audit software application system.
Took
Thought
we were hot stuff with the ease of implementation.
EDI transcripts exchange successes at USC
What we learned as we broadened our base of EDI trading partners (i.e. Texas Server deliverables):
EDI acknowledgement transactions are necessary for most senders
Handling EDI data from district schools
Imaging EDI transactions to existing systems (in real time)
Handling prior degree information in EDI transactions
Mapping FICE, ACT, and CEEB data reliably
Data rendering interface for Advisor use
EDI transcripts exchange successes at USC
Other lessons learned with EDI transcripts:
Handling ‘Unknown’ student transcript transactions
Handling unexpected transactions (unknown CEEBs)
How to handle EDI data for students not yet admitted
Reporting ‘change of data’ instances for administrative review
The importance of weekly reporting of EDI receipt activity
Development and production of outbound USC EDI transcript transactions – a humbling experience.
EDI transcripts exchange successes at USC
Where we were, and how far we have come:
2010 -- 1474 inbound TS130 transactions received
2011 -- 2212 inbound TS130 transactions received
2012 -- 4287 inbound TS130 transactions received
2013 -- 5828 inbound TS130 transactions received
2014 (through March 1) – 3700 inbound TS130 transactions received What really has changed? Hassle free, hands free transfer credit evaluations for every EDI transcript received (almost).
Electronic data workflow at USC
Electronic data workflow at USC
Transcript Viewer Utility
Rendered TS130 Data, with additional data populated from SIS:
Weekly activity report – Very important!
Resources Available to You: http://speedeserver.org
AP Exam data processing ETS
service provider makes available encrypted file for download
Easy
to register and use key pairs for decryption of data
Records
matching/mapping and data management will be your challenge
AP Exam data processing at USC Lessons
learned in handling this data well:
Records
USC uses last name, first name, and date of birth Intentionally, SSN matching is not engaged
How
matching criteria:
to manage unmatched records
Process to ‘re-index’ records Necessary on records where data is transposed or ill formatted Handling records where multiple student IDs are matched Process to archive data that has been re-indexed or deleted from process file queue Creating ‘inquiry’ records for unmatched record IDs
Handling AP
error codes No AP exam file left unprocessed. Period.
Successful vendor partnerships
USC sought help with a major processing bottleneck: International degree verification.
Facts:
USC is the largest provider of postsecondary education to international students
Every graduate student must have a prior degree verification on file, as a condition of admission
Successful vendor partnerships
The Problem:
The registrar’s office assumed responsibility for this service but was not provided any staff with subject matter expertise
The learning curve associated with the evaluation and authentication of transcript and diploma documents
The incident of fraudulent transcripts and credentials for international documents
USC is the largest provider of postsecondary education to international students
Successful vendor partnerships
The Solution:
Changed business practices to outsource evaluation services
Made the decision to single source the third party service provider
Began early in the vendor selection the discussion of codevelopment of services to deliver evaluation results through established EDI and/or XML standards
Represented this co-development as a win-win for all parties involved – USC, the vendor, and students
Successful vendor partnerships
Where we are today
We LOVE our third party vendor, IERF!
Open to co-development of any area that would improve services Always accessible and responsive Very helpful in other areas of processing
Since going live in November 2013, more than 750 verifications have been processed successfully (will process 2000+ annually) Has removed a full FTE+ assignment from this service area Has greatly improved quality and consistency of the evaluation process Protects USC from fraudulent documents and other areas of exposure Rollout of EDI transmissions could have not gone more smoothly
Other successful vendor partnerships Co-development
of application program interface with CollegeSource: Developed
web services to aid in the transfer course evaluation workflow at USC, which included:
Real time retrieval of course data from TES through an API Web service that acts as a ‘rules builder’ for Transfer Articulation (TA) table updates Enhanced administrative controls to oversee the types of credit being added to Transfer Articulation (TA) tables. The elimination of manual key entry of TA rules. Since implementation in January 2013, more than 11,000 rules have been successfully inserted into TA tables. The majority of an FTE was repurposed upon launch of API
CollegeSource data for USC evaluation needs
Worksheet details – Required data
Summary of evaluation screen view
dd
Taking the overhead out of Overseas Studies workflow What worked for USC Facts:
More than 750 students participate in sponsored overseas studies programs annually
More than 100 study abroad programs are available to students
Overseas studies work is reported as course work taken ‘in residence’ and is included on the USC transcript
Most students complete between four (4) and six (6) courses a semester while studying abroad
Each course must be articulated to USC equivalent departments and course levels, and loaded into SIS
Taking the overhead out of Overseas Studies workflow What worked for USC What
Proof of concept #1: Could we reliably articulate and report overseas course work in existing Transfer Articulation systems without disrupting other transfer credit processing?
First 12 months was focused on this effort Overseas studies work appeared on the Transfer Credit Report (TCR), but was identified as “home” course work
Proof of concept #2: Could we reliably limit the program unit caps based on the overseas program being processed?
we set out to do:
Had to identify each program by unique code Degree Audit encoding had to be able to limit courses, to include splitting of unit credit for course work that ‘straddled’ a unit limit Reporting of ‘split credit’ had to be reliable
Proof of concept #3: Could we extract the data needed based on the TCR run and import that data into SIS?
Earned credit, failed credit, course grades, titles, and term data items Split credit would be the show stopper if not handled properly Had to design business rules to ensure evaluation results would not change over time
Taking the overhead out of Overseas Studies workflow What worked for USC Where
we are today… Big Win!
Took two years to arrive, but we are now processing all overseas work through our existing Transfer Credit systems Results of overseas studies course work writes to SIS in real time Results are available immediately and are reflected in SIS and the student’s Degree Audit Processing was decreased from 20 business days to two (2) days Evaluation results are standardized from cycle to cycle The manual scheduling of course sections, loading and grading of sections, and all other manual work was eliminated The manual loading of the work alone required 700 hours of staff time annually All students who attended a fall 2013 study abroad program have been successfully processed through this automated configuration
Overseas Studies – What students and Advisors see
View of processed courses on the Transfer Credit Report
View of the USC transcript detail on SIS
Questions?
Email: [email protected] [email protected]
