Grand Rapids Community College: Enabling the Collaborative Campus

Click here to receive your FREE subscription to Campus Technology

Home > Grand Rapids Community College: Enabling the Collaborative Campus

Features

Grand Rapids Community College: Enabling the Collaborative Campus

9/13/2002

By Bob EngmarkBy , Victoria JanowiakBy , Howard Shanken

Shortly after we began the implementation, GRCC’s president of 27 years announced his retirement, an interim president was appointed and a national presidential search process began. In spite of the change, we felt it was critical to keep up momentum, so while the search continued, so did the project. In February 1999, Juan Olivarez was appointed president of the school and in March, we began the “go-live” process. Nine months later we were in production with admissions, student records, student financials, financial aid, human resources and financials.

Overcoming Challenges

Every major computer implementation project presents challenges, and the first year in production for GRCC was no different. Because of Y2K and the decision to implement only mission-critical applications, our end-users actually lost some of the technical functionality they had with the previous legacy system. Further, the decision to do the project in-house, with little or no release time for employees, was beginning to take its toll. But Dr. Olivarez and the campus leadership continued to demonstrate long-term commitment to the project through employee communications, strategic planning and providing additional resources as needed. Within 18 months, GRCC not only re-instated the functionality lost in the initial implementation, but delivered new applications.

Early Success

Simultaneously, GRCC was involved in a major accreditation project. The College was to participate in the North Central Association’s Academic Quality Improvement Project, an approach to accreditation using a continuous quality improvement model. The re-engineering work of the project, the skills developed by staff during the implementation, and the collaborative, continuous improvement approach we adopted were all factors that contributed to PeopleSoft selecting us for the newest version of its software, Release 8. The pure Internet strategy of the system fully supported our goal of continuously improving our services to our community.

GRCC students have already experienced benefits of the system by no longer having to stand in line for basic registration functions. On opening day of our fall registration, 83 percent of our students used either the Web and/or touch-tone to register for classes. Students are now able to check the status of their financial aid online or view personal tuition costs. In addition, our faculty members now submit grades online, demonstrating our shift to a culture of self-empowerment. GRCC’s new solution reaches beyond the horizons of “business as usual.” And if our implementation has taught us one thing, it is to go beyond what’s comfortable—to face our fear of change and embrace the possibilities that pure Internet technology can offer.