Standards-Based Electronic Transcripts for the University of Michigan

April 23, 2007Jeff Alderson

Director, Strategic PartnershipsConnectEdu, Inc

Duane MorinService ArchitectConnectEdu, Inc

Mark NelsonProduct Manager, Recruiting and Admissions

University of Michigan

• The High School Transcript Opportunity:– Colleges need electronic HS transcripts– HS lacks expertise, time, resources ($$)– Transcript-only solutions have historically

low utilization rates – value prop is too limited

• Solution?– Deliver electronic transcripts as part of a

going-to-college platform that meets the needs of students, parents, and counselors

• About ConnectEdu:– Provide students and families with a

comprehensive college planning, admissions and financial aid solution

– Help high schools, community colleges, and colleges simplify and streamline administrative tasks

– Provide colleges (2 and 4 year) with a cost-effective method to recruit applicants and improve admissions processes

• Our model:– Deploy in partnership with area colleges– Invite feeder high schools to join for free– Train and equip high school staff, parents

and students– Commit staff to the geography to provide

long-term support– Build value to colleges by creating a base

of electronic document-capable school districts

How I Spent My First Week At Connect!

“There’s this new PESC standard for High School Transcripts. Implement it.”

– July, 2006

• PESC High School Transcript Approved June, 2006

• XML via SOAP Web Services– Consistent data delivery. System to

system with no re-entering of data– Encryption, authentication– Immediate delivery

• Build it in .NET (C#)

Sample XML<TransmissionData> <Source>

<Organization/> </Source> <Destination> <Organization/> </Destination> </TransmissionData> <Student> <Person> <Name/> <Contacts> <Address/> </Contacts> </Person> <AcademicRecord> <AcademicSummary/> <AcademicSession> <Course/> <Course/>…

• Easily readable• Well organized• Easy to find what you

need• Many optional and/or

repeatable fields• User-defined

extensions

• Converted our older transcript repository into PESC-compatible object model

Person

Name

AddressAcademicSummary

TranscriptAcademicSessionAcademicSessionAcademicSession

CourseCourseCourse

AcademicRecord

AddressOrganizationOrganization

Reality Check!“Our first implementation will be University of

Michigan. They want to use EDI.”

• University of Michigan Platform– Oracle PeopleSoft Campus Solutions 8.1– PeopleTools 8.22– Oracle 10g– Upgrading to PS 9.0 in June 2008

• UMichigan Today• 27000+ incoming applications• 2-3 copies of transcript (in progress and final)• Letters of recommendation from multiple sources• Complete applications reviewed up to 3 times

• The Problems with Paper– Slow, unreliable– Postal = delayed / lost in the mail

• Postage costs!– Manual processing = time-consuming and error prone

For those who’ve never seen EDI…999ADM_TRNS_TS130 ADTRADM_EDI_STX UNIVADMISSIONOFFICE 13000049885220061207 16:23:41 15 REF487456928 ORG 231032 FOUR-O-LETTERGRADE HIGH SCHOOL20 PARK PLAZA BOSTON MA 02116 USAPER04 NAM02AMY NAM05O'REILLY ADR21 GALLUP TRAIL POMPANO BEACH FL 33067 USAC SES2 OTHR 20030901 20031224 SUMOTH 4.22 52.5 7 4.22 CRS CRS1 EDIRGB ALGEBRA I HON UNT2 B AL-01-H ... REF487697465 ORG 952119 BUILD26.1 20 PARK PLAZA ST. 930 BOSTON MA 02116 USAPER04

• Thanks for the roadmap!

• Organization, Person…Session… Summary…

• Hey, wait a second! This looks familiar!

UMichiganEDI/TS130(ok, sort of)

PESC XML

AcademicSummary

AcademicSessionAcademicSessionAcademicSession

CourseCourseCourse

AcademicRecord

text

AddressAddress

Person

Name

Transcript

OrganizationOrganizationAcademicSummary

AcademicSessionAcademicSessionAcademicSession

CourseCourseCourse

AcademicRecord

Course /Community /

StudentData

XML Transcript Request

XML Wrapper Objects

PESC-likeObject Layer

EDI WrapperObject Layer

HTML TranscriptXSL Print

EDIBatchFile

PESCXML

Web Service

Version 1.1

Student Requests transcript be sent to list of colleges

Transcript Workflow

Connect!Connect! emails counselor with transcript request

Counselor

Counselor logs into Connect! and accesses Transcript Manager

Connect! Connect!

(two possible scenarios)

College Partner Non College Partner

Connect! displays electronic submittal button

Connect! displays page with:- Mailing Address- Print Transcript Button- Input box with request for counselor to type in date the intend to mail transcript to college

CollegePartner

CollegePartner

College Partner logs into Connect! and accesses Application Manager, views, prints, or saves transcript

OR

Data integration process uploads transcript to College Partner application processing system

Counselor(OFFLINE)

Counselor enters intended mailing date, prints transcript, hits submit

Counselor mails transcript to college

Connect!Connect! updates transcript status with Mailed + Date

Connect!Connect! updates transcript status to Received By Name + Date

Counselor

Connect!

Counselor hits submit

Connect! transmits transcript to College Partner, updates transcript status to Sent To Name + Date

• Go with the flow, don’t get in the way

• Guidance counselors still have to review and approve

Electronic Workflow– Student makes request to send transcript to an

electronically enhanced college partner.– Guidance counselor reviews and approves, but now

request moves into READY state. Experience for the student and GC is the same as traditional sending to college partners.

– Once per day, all READY requests are processed and a batch is placed onto SFTP server.

• READY becomes SENT.• College partner user can still view/print transcripts during this

process, just not change their state.– Once per day, college partner system logs in

(automatically), downloads files for local processing.

Electronic loading of transcript data for UM• Each night a batched data file is automatically picked up by UM

and placed on our server• A process is run to read the file and load the data into a series

of suspense tables• Data validation occurs, error reports are generated if something

is amiss• Search/Match process occurs. Process identifies the high

school code in our system, and locates the applicant’s record• Post process loads transcript data into the appropriate tables in

PeopleSoft• Problem records remain in suspense. Undergrad Admissions

staff check these tables to resolve any issues that stop post from occurring

But Wait! There’s More!• Letters of Recommendation

– Mostly freeform text, but meta data still applies (source, destination, contact info, transmission data….)

– No standard– Image (PDF) to be scanned

• Workflow (almost) exactly same– Request. [Approve?] Make available.– Once per day, pick up a batch.– Acknowledge receipt.– Unlike transcript, LOR has multiple sources and multiple

documents.– Matching done by Connect identifier, relies on the transcript

already existing in the system.

• An LOR Batch

Archive: CU20061107-10001-9.zip CID7279939-1.pdf OK CID7279939-1.txt OK CID7279939-2.pdf OK CID7279939-2.txt OK CID7279939-3.pdf OK CID7279939-3.txt OK CID7028859-1.pdf OK CID7028859-1.txt OK CID7028859-2.pdf OK CID7028859-2.txt OK CID7028859-3.pdf OK CID7028859-3.txt OK CID7363519-1.pdf OK CID7363519-1.txt OK CID7376338-1.pdf OK CID7376338-1.txt OK CID7382972-1.pdf OK CID7382972-1.txt OK

• CU20061107-10001-9– 20061107 = timestamp– 10001 = unique token (multiple files per day?)– 9 = number of letters to expect in the file

• CID7279939-2.pdf/txt– 72279939 = student identifier– 2 = sequence (i.e. second letter of the batch)– *.pdf = the letter itself– *.txt = meta information about the letter

Electronic loading of Recommendation Images• Each night a batched data file is automatically picked up by

UM and placed on our server• A process is run to read the file and load the images into an

Import Agent• Corresponding index file is used to match the Connect

identifier (loaded into PeopleSoft via the transcript load) with the specific related images

• Images are loaded into Imaging Software using the applicants UMID as one of the key values

• Images are immediately available to be viewed by Admissions staff

• Non-matches are held in special queue for Admissions staff to review and resolve

• What about acknowledgement? – User interface can track “sent” but what about

“received”? • FTP Acknowledgement Handshake

– IDX File<Transcripts> <ID>5A909E9D3FFF39E1BD28B69EBC503CBF</ID> <ID>5DDAB9143FFF39E1B7923D5DC16E185F</ID></Transcripts>

– College system must delete the associated data file from the server, signaling “We have received the transcripts/letters for these students.”

• All or nothing!

The Ultimate Success Story: GPA Recalculation

“Now we just need a database dump of every course taken at every high school.”

“How are you getting that now?”“Every summer admissions staff call up the high schools and get the paper catalogs.”

GPA Recalculation: Manual

• UM does not use ‘delivered’ GPA from High Schools (weighted vs. unweighted)

• Courses are flagged as ‘academic’ or ‘non-academic’

• Only ‘academic’ courses factor into UM GPA• Every transcript is manually recalculated with this

model• Each transcript can take up to 10 minutes to

recalculate, longer if an applicant has more than one transcript to review

GPA Recalculation – Automated• Incoming Course data is matched to courses

in a set up table• There must be a one to one match of course

details in setup for incoming courses to post successfully

• Courses are ‘flagged’ as academic or non-academic before loading into course tables

• Custom program ‘calculates’ GPA using academic courses and UM-defined rules

GPA Recalculation – Benefits• Over 100 High School Partners in Michigan

signed on with ConnectEdu• Estimating 7500 transcripts will be received

electronically next season• 1250 hours saved by auto calculating GPA• Doesn’t include non-Michigan High School

ConnectEdu partners!• Transcript standardization

• Many different transcript layouts• Customized display page of transcript data

streamlines review process

Course Catalog Web Service– A one-time SQL query became our High School

Course Catalog “web service”(Currently run by human interaction, hence not a true Web Service.)

– Each summer, High School course data is queried from ConnectEdu

– Existing course data setup is queried from PeopleSoft and compared

– New/modified courses are uploaded to setup table– Greatly streamlines UM current process and

eliminates reliance on external ‘side system’ for maintaining High School course data

Lessons Learned

• Getting Started : Assembling The Team– What platform will consume/process the data? How

much coding is required, and who is doing it?– IT/Security needs to be brought in as soon as

possible to make sure their requirements are met– Both teams need to understand how the other team’s

data systems work, what data is available, and how required data needs to be used for specific processes

Matching Records– Any time data is loaded from an external source, there must be a high

level of confidence that we are loading the data to the correct record.– Typical data matching fields include first and last name, SSN, birth date,

and address– There are various confidence levels of matching; some levels are a

clear match, some levels are a clear ‘no-match’, and everything in the middle is anyone’s guess

– Some user intervention is necessary for the ambiguous cases– Lesson learned: encourage High Schools to send all key matching fields

• Without these fields, most records end up in suspense, requiring manual matching to occur

– ISSUE : Some personal data best used to identify/match students becomes more of a security / privacy risk for the organization, resulting in more resources spent protecting the data.

• GPA Recalculation– Everyone does it differently– Up-to-date course catalog is mandatory!

• Course names and descriptions change more often than expected

– Electronic transcript management produces a “courses taken” catalog as a side benefit

– Standard categorization of course (i.e. “Algebra 101”=>”Intermediate Math”) goes a long way toward centralizing and streamlining the process

• Transcript AcknowledgementStudent: “Did the college receive my transcript?”Parent: <freak out> <phone call>Guidance Counselor: “I don’t know, the system never responded. Let me make a call and see what I can find out…”– The sending institution needs feedback on proper receipt and

processing of the transcript, otherwise it’s all shrugs and phone calls.

– Daily FTP batch is more error prone in this regard– PESC Transcript Batch and Acknowledgement Standard nearing

completion (for web services)• Still, the acknowledgement standard twice references “if something

goes wrong, get on the phone.”

Where Are We Now?– University of Michigan

• With over 100 High Schools in Michigan participating next year, we expect significant positive impacts to the admissions process

– Reduced staff time for recalculating GPAs– Reduced staff time opening mail– Reduced staff time for imaging Transcripts and Letters of

Recommendation– Faster completion rates for applications– Improved customer service for our High School

counselors and applicants!

Where Are We Now?• Connect!

– Web Service Delivering PESC Standard HS Transcripts Running (March, 2007)

• Michigan State University• Letters of Recommendation (“ConnectXML”) included• On-demand, with acknowledgement for each document

– Coming Soon (hopefully before my one year review!)

• Data Transport Specification (DTS)• Newly collected fields : graduation date, diploma type, mid-

semester grades, class rank• New standard tests : PSAT, AP

• Questions?– Jeff Alderson

jalderson@connectedu.net– Duane Morin

dmorin@connectedu.net

– Mark Nelson mnelson@umich.edu