In a way, colleges are rather like small towns. There are places that provide food, distribute the mail, keep the campus safe, maintain buildings, provide energy, process our financial transactions and provide funding sources for citizens of Carleton, and so on. Like most villages, Carleton uses a robust collection of technology to help it run smoothly and efficiently. Some of these systems you likely see and interact with, such as The Hub. Others are a bit less visible, such as Reason (which powers our web site) and Papercut (which manages printing across campus).
During winter term, we are taking a look at a few of our core enterprise systems that keep our campus running. They are critical to our campus operations, and it’s healthy to take a step back every now and then to ensure that they continue to be the proper fit, that we’ve implemented them fully, and that we are on the right track for providing service to the campus in upcoming years. The primary systems under review are:
- Colleague/Hub (student information, human resources, financials, etc)
- Reason (custom apps in Reason such as Enroll)
- Advance (alumni information)
- Salesforce (alumni volunteer portal)
In addition to looking at software that we have installed at Carleton, we’ll be thinking about software that doesn’t yet exist on campus, and that may be able to provide functionality to further our campus mission. By the end of winter term, our consultants will provide us with a ‘Fit/Gap Analysis’ of our enterprise software landscape at Carleton.
In collaboration with consultants that work with campuses across the country, the CTO and Senior Staff of the college will take a look at our current needs and gaps that may influence software decisions over the next 5 years.
If you have questions about this process, please reach out to Julie Creamer (jcreamer) or Janet Scannell (jscannell).