PeopleSoft Resolution Team Meeting Minutes

Agenda Item and Presenter(s)

Discussion

Follow-up Action

Decisions

Meeting Called to Order:

Tony Hale

3:05 pm

AVC Lam is working on parity pay and will join the meeting soon. 

I. Update on PeopleSoft Projects

a) Academic Advising Module (Tripp/Phillips/Counselors)

Last Monday the Pine Tree Group completed the development of the IT module and as they got ready to do a demonstration, they discovered that AA reports were missing. After troubleshooting with Oracle it was discover that there is a problem with data conversion and how data conversion was set up. Pine Tree consultants have met with IT and AVC Lam came with suggestions as to how fix the problem, but so far none have work. Oracle believes that the main issue is data conversion and correcting this will be a big project.

 Beth Tripp and her team met this morning with VC Budd, AVC Lam, and Jo Ann Phillips. They were all given assignments that will assist in moving forward.

Pine Tree lost 4 days last week and will probably spend this week working around the problem. Instead of being 3 weeks to implementation, it looks more like 4 or 5 weeks out.

VPSS Kerry Compton has been giving feedback to Pine Tree as how the end users would like things to look. Users are very happy at how things are progressing. At this point the issues with data conversion do not affect the advising group, since they have not selected who would be doing the testing. One item that requires more discussion with VPs is the Major Selection.

b) Infrastructure Update Report (Lam)

The installation for Berkeley City College was schedules for today. Merritt and Laney have been schedule for a later date. The campuses are working with the vendors. Also, rolling into the new design at the district level. Part of the infrastructure is to coordinate with the campuses for implementation. PeopleSoft would be migrated by late July or early August.

AVC Mike Orkin expressed concern with doing this during Fall enrollment. And Jo Ann is concern about doing this without a DBA on board. Tony asked about whether users would be involved in the testing stage.

AVC Lam has been contacted by Human Resources as the status of the DBA hiring and there are two candidates that are moving forward in the hiring process. Regarding any conflict with peak registration, the migration can be moved to later in August. And as the go-live date approaches, IT will inform end users and maybe student ambassadors can be part of testing.

Victor Flint mentioned that one of the outcomes of the students’ meeting with the Chancellor is that the Student Trustees would like to be part of the testing process.

c) Database Backups: How are backups for PS-related resources performed? (Lam)

DES Tony Hale mentioned that this topic came up in an informal meeting and it would be important for people to know how backups are done. Database backups are redundant, they go to tape and in addition there’s another backup that goes to the cloud. Cloud backups are intended for disaster recovery, not for archiving. We don’t do archiving as best as it should be done and need to improve archiving methods.

VC Budd asked if the new infrastructure will help with archiving. Tony explained that the new infrastructure will not improve archiving. It only addresses disaster recovery.

VPSS Eric Gravenberg asked about the risk exposure. Tony explained that as far as disaster recovery we are doing ok, but need to make big improvements to the archiving method. The priorities are appropriate, but need to turn our attention to archiving. 

II. Update from Director of Enterprise Services

Tony Hale

a) Transition plan for DES Hale’s Departure

This is the last PRT for DES Tony Hale. He will be leaving Peralta as of tomorrow. Tony is trying to wrap up as many projects as possible and documenting on-going projects as much as possible.

Jo Ann inquired about the status of hiring a DBA. Both Tony and Jo Ann were part of the hiring committee and, thus, cannot go into much detail, but the process is still open and underway. It is possible that a DBA can be in place in about a month.

Beth Tripp asked if there is a bridge process. There was a contract for a DBA to work for two weeks and the contract was extended for little bit more. Hank Phan was the temporary DBA. It would be great to have him work on a part-time basis and this is being considered.

b) Proposal to change nomenclature for “Issues”

Right now we talk about issues log. Tony would like to take it from ‘issues’ to ‘Project Logs’. Some of the items on the logs are not problems, but more proposed projects or projects that are underway. Within the Project Logs we distinguish between fixes, add-ons, customizations, etc.

There was discussion about Progress Probation and the performance issues with this project. Jo Ann explained that is not just a matter of putting this back in production, but with the testing of service indicators.

VC Budd asked for more discussion as to how Progress Probation affects Financial Aid students. VPSS Kerry Compton explained that students fall into disqualification without this report running. Right now the staff is looking at things manually. Progress Probation will greatly help with Financial Aid. Progress Probation is in the testing stage, but Tony says it can be rolled into production today. Kerry would like to see the implementation of soft holds during the first semester to see how that work before implementing hard holds.

Tony also explained that the Electronic PA project is not included in the PRT Issues Log because at the moment is sitting on the HR log and the PRT has nothing to do with that project for now.

c) PeopleSoft Functionality Survey Results

AVC Mike Orkin passed out the summary of this year’s survey, as well as last year’s survey results. These results can be helpful when prioritizing which projects to work on. A comparison between this year’s and last year’s results has not been done yet.

One of the main concerns for faculty is communication with students via email. Even thought students can opt to have their Peralta email forward to a personal email, not all students know how to do this or have not set up their emails to do so. Another issue is the fact that some faculty prefer to use their personal email instead of their Peralta email.

Connie Willis asked if there is a way to set up and communicate through forums. This might be accomplished, but not through our email system. Each individual can set up rules to sort incoming email to specific folders.

d) PRT web site review

The website has change quite a bit in the last few weeks. It used to be static pages and now is more a dynamic space where posts are added every week.

The website became more interactive thanks to the efforts of Tony Hale. Silvia Cortez will continue to post the lists of current and completed projects on a weekly basis. The website also includes agendas and minutes from the PAT and the steering committees.

e) PAT – PeopleSoft Analyst Team

This group met about 3 weeks ago. Tony encourages this group to keep meeting. Not sure who will be leading this group after Tony’s departure.

f) Routing of trouble-tickets

Recently, the colleges have been routing calls from students to Ram Anumula in IT. We are asking staff to direct students to create a trouble ticket through FootPrints or to assist them in creating this trouble tickets. These tickets will be routed to A&R first and if it cannot be resolved by them, then the issues will be routed by the A&R staff to Ram. The reason for this is to be able to track all the issues through FootPrints and to see what is causing the problems.

In the past we have used the reset@peralta.edu to assists students with login problems, but no one is checking this email.

Student Ambassadors might be able to assist by routing issues through the office of Student Services. Also, refer students to the FAQ in A&R’s website.

g) PeopleSoft Steering Committee Report

This group is made up of all Vice Chancellors and Associate Vice Chancellors. They will decide how to address issues.

These are the top 5 priorities that came out of their last meeting (in no particular order):

• Student records that are prohibiting correct tuition calculation,
• Debit card processing,
• Degree audit report,
• Pro-rata support,
• Grade book/attendance roster

This group meets every two weeks. AVC Lam will take leadership of this group.

h) Project Status Review – Issues Log/Steering Committee Priorities

There are 34 projects on the roster. There is a new format for the roster, organized according to priority and then according to assignees. When the length of time for a specific project is unknown, we used the standard 1,000 hours. This doesn’t mean time from submission, but the actual time it would take to work on each project. Projects are maintained by the programmers. This list is available on the website.

Victor Flint would like to see a description as to how each one of the top five projects will benefit the students. Tony has no problem defending the projects, but need to work on establishing communication with the students. Victor suggests communicating through the Student Ambassadors.

VC Gerhard believes that adding information as to how these projects impact students will help to make it clear why these are the top five projects. 

III. Report out from Committees

a) Financial Aid – Judy Cohen

Judy did not attend the meeting, but she submitted her report to Tony Hale:

Functional configuration scheduled for completion August 2011. Per discussion with SAFE Project Manager, EMASPro has been working on system code as the team completes each functional screen approval. EMASPro will accelerate configuration in August. Peralta team should be working on integration points. There is urgency for decision between IT and Fiscal to determine disbursement process. Recommends beginning process through Data Mart.

Judy’s last day with Peralta is June 29, 2011

Ram, Gopaal and Kyu will be working on the Financial Aid integration. Jo Ann is concerned that there is not enough manpower for this project.

b) Counseling – Kerry Compton

The counseling group has been working with Pine Tree and most of their issues were cover earlier in the meeting.

c) Human Resources – David Betts

David Betts did not attend the meeting. VC Gerhard went over some of the projects HR is working on:

• Automatic step-in column for part-time faculty: contractor is on board and has been working with HR. The contractor is EB5C,
• Electronic PA,
• Compliance requirements,
• Time and Labor (payroll),
• Absence Management Modules

d) Library – Krista Johns

Krista Johns did not attend the meeting.

Gopaal has been working with Evelyn Lord. He created student data sample and gave it to Evelyn for testing. She is contact with Innovative Interfaces (Millennium) and needed to ask them for some clarification.

Right now the team is working on data conversion from Horizon to Millennium. This is a completely new system that will keep track of student loans. Evelyn Lord is the lead and Linnea Wren is providing technical assistance with the servers.

e) Matriculation – Donald Moore

No report.

f) Schedulers – Sheryl Queen

No report.

g) Student Finance – Connie Willis/Dominique Benavides

Dominique Benavides worked with Ram and Oracle to resolve the issues with fee calculation. There are still 500 accounts that need to be resolved. Dominique will send reminders about how to apply BOG. Next issues to work on are Financial Aid and students’ holds.

This group will meet tomorrow. A recent issue that came up is credit card payments, but this has been resolved. Looking at ways to deal with trust accounts.

h) Student Services – Eric Gravenberg

Students held a brown-bag meeting with the Chancellor on June 7, 2011. Some of the students at the meeting have gone through the many issues of PeopleSoft, especially with Financial Aid. Student Ambassadors are at the frontline, but the colleges need to improve communication. Students understand the centralization of A&R and Financial Aid, but they would like to participate in the PRT and are recommending Student Trustees can represent them.

Student leaders have some ideas as to how resolve some of the issues than can be done parallel to the PRT efforts, they are talking about setting up their own top issues, which might be different than the top PRT issues. Students would like to have a unified voice and if the information is disseminated through the students, it might get a better reception at the colleges.

If this group is ok with their proposal, the VPSS and Deans of Student Services will work with students during the summer to put together a written report.

Tony recommends making sure there is a consistent student representation at the PRT meetings.

i) Budget/Finance – Marybeth Benvenutti/Ron Gerhard

Finance will begin to meet with IT and Financial Aid to discuss the timelines for the Financial Aid process. At the moment here are two issues: Fees (debits and credits) and disbursement.

j) Admissions and Records – Joyce Brown-Willis

Joyce wants to point out how much she appreciates everything that Tony has done at Peralta this couple of months. She is currently working on cleaning up student accounts. Also working with AVC Orkin and Tony on the A&R website migration. Joyce has run into some problems with pre-requisite drops, but she’s working on them.

Tony suggests that Student Services recruits students to test the A&R website. Victor and Eric will assist with this.

k) Institutional Effectiveness/BI – Mike Orkin

AVC Orkin has added more tools to BI. Going through the final stages of hiring a permanent person, right now a consultant is doing all the work for BI. The BI tools are available to everybody.

l) Instructional Faculty – Alexis Alexander

No Report 

IV. Other

VC Budd pointed out that this group has come a long way, especially with the assistance of DES Tony Hale. When Tony came on board Debbie suggested a steering committee and Tony put all that together. Many thanks to Tony for all the hard work he has put into PRT the last few months.

Adjournment:

5:00p

Next meeting:

August 1, 2011, 3p – 5p

District Office Board Room