LEWIS Lines #9

May 2001

1. North of the Border--SCT Summit
   A number of folks from Lehigh participated in the recent SCT users meeting in Toronto last month. Among them were: Manny Pena, Tom Smull, Linda Bell, Robin Bodnar, Robert Brownell, Bruce Correll, John Early, Toni Lee Febbo, Gail Fullman, Emil Gnasso, Mary Gurgick, Steve Guttman, Brian Hearn, Ronnie Hesch, Scott Knauss, Gerry Lennon, Kathy Miller, Willa Ostrosky, Dot Ouellette, Javier Rivera, Bob Siegfried, Leslie Snow, and Randy Wambold. To capture the flavor of the conference, here are brief comments from several attendees.
2. SCT Summit--Manny Pena
   "I was glad to have the opportunity to attend SCT's most recent conference in Toronto. Of particular interest to me were several of the SCT provided sessions about their latest software release, Banner 5.0. This new release is primarily technical in nature, in that many previously identified software bugs have been corrected and incorporated into the new release. There is also some new functionality which has been added that will benefit our Banner users. Most commented about was the ability to easily download Banner generated information into a spreadsheet. Much of the information gathered will help with our planning associated with implementing Banner 5.0 at Lehigh."
3. SCT Summit--John Early
   "This year's Summit conference was my first, and upon arrival I was a bit overwhelmed by the sheer size of everything. With literally hundreds of informational sessions to choose from, and dozens that sounded very interesting, I think the hardest part of the conference was choosing which sessions to attend. I ended up focusing on Banner reporting, the Web for products, and Portal integration, and found excellent sessions in each area. I learned about techniques used at University of North Carolina to replace SCT's static class schedule Web page with a dynamically generated Web page, with lots of excellent PL/SQL code shared as examples. I saw how my colleagues at Villanova deployed the Web for products from Recruiting to Registration and how those at Rennsalaer fit distance education into the Banner registration framework. The most eye-opening sessions were those relating to the various portal products, including Campus Pipeline, and the experiences that other institutions have implementing them. Being able to talk with those who have already gone down the path of implementing particular portals, and also talk with those facing choices similar to those Lehigh is about to make, helped me to see how important the portal decision is, and to see what are the questions that Lehigh must be able to answer before making a final selection."
4. SCT Summit--Bob Siegfried
   "I was particularly excited about the Banner 5.0 enhancement to both Banner Forms and Web for Finance that will enable end users to download financial information directly to Excel. I know they will absolutely love this new feature. I also learned that we are not the only Banner institution having problems with payroll encumbrances. One school presented how they modified baseline Banner processes to solve this problem. Members of the Finance team attended a variety of sessions specific to their areas and the contacts we made are invaluable resources as we prepare to go live in July."
5. SCT Summit--Tom Smull
   "Since Lehigh is getting ready to start its data warehouse (DW) effort, I concentrated on sessions dealing with that topic. It is not surprising to find that there is some confusion as to what exactly a DW is. Many people consider a copy of current Banner data to be a DW, but a true DW stores information over multiple time periods, allowing in-depth trend analysis and the like. With that in mind, the tools used to report from the DW are often different from those used for daily system processing. Graphic presentation is not uncommon. One point stressed by the DW presenters is that a DW project never really ends. Refinement and expansion of information continue indefinitely. As usual at a users' conference, some of the best information is gathered from other Banner users. Business cards are exchanged and contacts are established. And perhaps most importantly, SCT gets to hear directly from their customers the good, the bad, and the ugly about their products."
6. Web for Alumni--"Key and Ye Shall Find!"
   The development officer component of Web for Alumni is now being used by development staff. It is a very powerful tool that allows them to access information about donor prospects from their desks or offsite and to see the data displayed according to their own preferences. Information that previously had to be requested from someone else can also now be viewed online, and donor contact reports can be entered which feed directly into Banner. Watch for other parts of Web for Alumni to be rolled out this fall.
7. Web for Finance--Final Push
   The Finance team is busy working on conversions and interfaces and testing and fine tuning initial set ups. They are simultaneously preparing for both a fiscal year end in FRS and the conversion to Banner Finance that will all take place over the first few weeks in July. The team is also setting up security and access for over 500 current FRS users and preparing training materials for training sessions scheduled to begin this month. Training will be provided for access to both Banner Forms and Web for Finance. Some key administrative staff in the deans' offices recently attended a preview training session and were impressed with the system capabilities. Some kinds of reporting that they currently provide for the deans will be much easier in Banner.