FERPA: House unveils bipartisan bill to update FERPA

House education lawmakers introduced legislation to update student privacy protections under the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA). Academic Support Resources (ASR) will keep the campus community apprised as this progresses.

Registrar’s Advisory Committee meeting on Monday

The next Registrar’s Advisory Committee (RAC) meeting will be held on Monday, August 3 from 9:30 a.m.-12 p.m. in 412 Bruininks Hall. To view the full agenda, please click here. Please RSVP.

2015-16 MN tuition reciprocity rates released

We have received the 2015-2016 tuition reciprocity rates for the University of Minnesota campuses from the MN Higher Education Office. Of note this year, all reciprocity students from Wisconsin should now be charged the higher of the Minnesota or Wisconsin resident rate for the level, program and campus attended. The State of Wisconsin will no longer offer these students a tuition supplement to bridge the gap between the higher Minnesota rates and the Wisconsin rates, since that feature expired at the end of the 2014-2015 academic year.

2015-16 tuition and fees are now live on One Stop website

The 2015-16 tuition and fees fact sheets are now available on the One Stop website.

• Undergraduate
• Graduate

Astra Schedule upgrade completed

The much anticipated Astra Schedule software upgrade was completed this week. This upgrade did not impact PeopleSoft/CCS. The UMN Astra system maintenance team has been working closely with Ad Astra developers to ensure a smooth upgrade and to ensure UMN business processes will be accommodated in the upgrade. One of the benefits of the upgrade is the improved performance speeds of the calendars.

8xxxxxx ID numbers now being issued

Historically, University of Minnesota identification numbers were assigned sequentially as new numbers are needed by staff, faculty and students. However, ID numbers are currently being issued starting from 8xxxxxx for new employees. Colleges and staff may start seeing these numbers more frequently, they can be trusted and treated the same as other U of M identification numbers.

One Stop implements Salesforce knowledge base FAQ software

One Stop launched its new knowledge base FAQ software through Salesforce. The software will help counselors and other staff access and contribute important information in one shared resource for students, streamlining workflows and improving response. For a few weeks, the software will go through a soft launch while users watch for bugs and monitor student behavior. When all articles are published and things prove to be working well, One Stop will begin to bring more focus through their current home and contact us pages, eventually linking to the knowledge base in MyU. The knowledge base can be found by going to onestop.umn.edu and clicking on Ask One Stop at the bottom of the page. This site is still in transition, more articles will be added on an ongoing basis.

GSSP seeing success in customer service model

Since adopting a new customer service model utilizing Salesforce, an Auto-Caller Distribution (ACD) phone line, and five new Customer Relations Representatives in the fall of 2014, the Graduate Student Services and Progress (GSSP) office has been able to make a positive difference in students’ lives by improving form tracking, maintaining response times by using Salesforce statistics for proactive scheduling and project prioritization, and keeping better customer interaction records to investigate and resolve errors. The new model has helped to spread out work more equitably and allows the team to provide better back-up coverage during meetings and absences. The tiered model has also added value to student interactions by providing faster responses for general questions and added context for questions that are routed to the second tier of support. GSSP will continue to utilize statistics and trends from Salesforce data to inform process improvements that will ultimately benefit students, faculty, and staff.