What's the Latest?
October 13
Avondale's legacy student management system SRS is now read-only as Callista, the new system, went live on Friday 10 October. 'This is part of a phased implementation,' says project manager Rose Howson. 'The Enquiry & Enrolment Centre and Academic Office are now using Callista, and course co-ordinators will begin later this week.'
Sharon Turner, Team Leader of the Enquiry & Enrolment Centre, says Callista allows an applicant to keep track of the admission process via the new online Applicant Portal. 'Communication with the applicant will be much more effective,' she says. 'Cheers were heard down the hall when overnight online applicants successfully applied and transferred into the system with ease. This is a more efficient management system that also facilitates the first step towards a paperless admission process.'
The Academic Office has already begun updating forms to match the new processes of Callista. 'We are working towards online enrolment to reduce queues at Registration,' Academic Registrar Dr Gwen Wilkinson says. 'By 2009, students will be able to enrol themselves and input information into the system directly.'
Callista Consulting Manager Kerrie Ryan says Avondale has done an excellent job in implementing Callista, especially considering the smaller project staff size. 'Other universities have employed a large number of staff to implement the same system,' she says. 'The Callista head office is very excited that Avondale has successfully gone live.'
September 22
Avondale's legacy SRS (student records system) is fast approaching the end of its useful life. Project Connect's Technical Team are finishing off data migration and making final preparations for transition into Callista SMS - the new system - scheduled to take place during next week. Eldon Rosenberg, Ben Reuter, Bevan Hendricks and Brian Greentree all work in their respective, specialist areas to ensure Callista provides accessible and accurate information. 'Callista will streamline many of the administrative and academic business functions at Avondale,' Bevan Hendricks says.
Eldon Rosenberg, who is the longest serving IT staff member at Avondale and the developer/maintainer of SRS, leads the technical team in migrating the data from SRS into the new Callista system, and developing customised reports and functionality for the College. As Ben Reuter says, 'Callista is a catalyst for a new way of working which is more informed, more accurate, more efficient and more responsible.'
September 8
As Project Connect finalises plans for Callista to go live in less than a month, Chris Boddey, the team's training officer, begins the main training program for staff.
'I have been learning the system and developing training materials during the build and transition phases of the project,' he says. 'Callista is a complex and powerful system which I believe will deliver a much needed boost to information access at Avondale.'
While this is not the first time staff have been exposed to the new administrative system, it is the beginning of a major change in Avondale's business processes which will allow both staff and students easy access to a greater range of information. 'Roadshow demonstrations throughout August both at the Sydney and Lake Macquarie campuses provided previews of what Callista will offer,' Chris says. 'Now the staff will learn how to use and explore all of its potential. I expect the impact of Callista on Avondale will be positive and ongoing.'
Callista will go-live with the Enquiry and Enrolment Centre on October 7.
August 27
After 20 months of planning, designing, building and testing, in just six weeks Avondale will finally implement the new student management system powered by the software known as Callista.
This system will not only facilitate the management of all aspects of a student's academic progress, from application to graduation, but will also replace the long-lived legacy of an Avondale built program known as SRS (Student Record System).
As these last six weeks draw closer, the Project CONNECT team are finalising training materials, the migration of data from the old system to the new, the look of student reports (e.g. transcripts) while also ensuring other college systems can collaborate with ours where needed.
