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Email by Query and the Student Message Center

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Session Number: 27146
Track: General Interest
Sub-Categorization: Oracle Approved
Session Type: Case Study
Presenter: Gary Saunders (University of Maine System)
Co-presenter: Tammy Light (University of Maine System)

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Target Audience: Functional
Audience Level: General
Level of Customization: Bolt-On
Project Phase: Production
Project Go Live: Q2 2009
Version Presenting: PS 8.9
Product: PeopleSoft
CPE Eligible: No

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There is an ever-increasing need for campus Registrar, Bursar and Financial Aid offices to send communications from PeopleSoft to all or specific groups of students. Although methods to send communications from PeopleSoft currently exist, they require a great deal of prior setup and must be implemented by the technical team. Additionally, it is often the case that the communications contain confidential information that is stored in PeopleSoft. Per University Counsel advice, this information should not be sent via email. Campus offices require the ability to send targeted electronic communications to students in a timely manner and without relying on technical team assistance for each communication.

Most students prefer receiving and accessing information electronically and with rising postal costs and diminishing budgets, a secure, reliable and cost-effective way of communicating with students is necessary. To avoid sending confidential information via email, there needs to be a method to post detailed and, when necessary, confidential communications to students in a secure environment and to notify them via email that a communication has been posted to their account. This utility will reduce or eliminate the need for satellite systems that provide similar functionality but require the exporting of data out of PeopleSoft Campus Solutions and system maintenance of the satellite systems.

Examples of notification or emergency situations:
• Announce Student Accounts (Bills) are posted or that there has been a change to the bill
• Change in Financial Aid status instructing the student to look at their aid package or contact information within Financial Aid.
• Academic Action and the appeals process surrounding the action
• Administrative Actions (Judicial Affairs) and the appeal process surrounding the action
• Health Centers may post messages through the counseling center on appointments and referrals
• CLEP exam results
• An emergency situation that must quickly go out to all students. If the campus alert system is utilized
• School closing information

The Message Center, offered as link from the Student Center, can be utilized by campus offices to send either personalized or generic messages to students. Specifically, the Message Center offers the following new features:
• Ability to communicate with all students or a subset of the students
• Allows users to identify target audience by incorporating PS Query to isolate certain student populations or providing a file of student IDs
• Ability to post a text comment, active hyperlink, etc.
• Ability to generate personalized messages inside the message center (although the emails are delivered in batch, they contain dynamic content, i.e., “Dear John, Your Fall semester G.P.A. of 1.75 is unsatisfactory…”)
• The messages have an end-date that will remove the message from the student’s view to prevent clutter
• The ability to notify students that they have a message in the Message Center that needs attention.
• Ability to determine student has read the message
• Provide student the ability to remove specific messages from his view
• Staff will have view of messages for individual students and will have an ability to view active communications
• Without using the BCC field to hide email addresses, students only see their email address in the message “To” field.