Building a Powerful Academic Operations Platform with CourseLeaf

"Their willingness to hear what we were looking for and do what they could to make a solution fit our business and process needs put them far ahead of the competition."

Amanda Daddona, Associate Registrar at Wesleyan University

Data entry errors and a cumbersome combination of paper and electronic forms motivated the administration at Wesleyan University to find a solution that could help streamline the process and provide an innovative way to send forms to the correct people for approval, while minimizing lost paperwork and collecting historical data. The solution also had to offer advanced integration with their SIS, PeopleSoft Campus Solutions.

“We had to find a partner that could help to streamline our processes,” recalls Amanda Daddona, Associate Registrar at Wesleyan University. “We needed to eliminate paper and create a way to retain historical records. Our course approval forms were collected and stored in binders in the Registrar’s Office, taking up an extraordinary amount of space. We really wanted to turn a cumbersome and somewhat unreliable process into something much smoother, cleaner, efficient, and transparent.”

Before implementing CourseLeaf, the team at Wesleyan managed their curriculum and catalog through a combination of paper and electronic forms, collected by the Registrar’s Office and entered manually into their student information system, PeopleSoft. Looking at the big picture, the Wesleyan team knew they wanted a solution that would handle the catalog, program-level data, course-level data, and section-level data.

“We are happy to say we have an incredibly powerful system to collect and manage our entire curriculum in CourseLeaf CAT, CIM, and CLSS. New course proposals are approved quickly, where before it could take weeks for paper to get to all the appropriate desks, now it takes days!” added Daddona.

“CourseLeaf was on our radar. When we sat with the team, we knew this was our partner. They were extremely positive, supportive, and collaborative. Their willingness to hear what we were looking for and do what they could to make a solution fit our business and process needs put them far ahead of the competition. CourseLeaf allowed us to manage program, course, and section-level data, which the others did not,” said Daddona.

Through brainstorming sessions and a hands-on approach, CourseLeaf was able to provide Wesleyan with innovative and efficient ways to improve their modules and business practices. They now have an electronic history record of changes in CIM Courses and CIM Programs.

The team at Wesleyan continues to collaborate with CourseLeaf to bring new software and technology forward in all areas of curriculum management. Most recently, the have begun work on the CIM Bridge, which will integrate tightly with PeopleSoft – using the data in their SIS system, the software will regularly perform accuracy checks to ensure the data in CourseLeaf matches the data in PeopleSoft.

“It’s a great product! It not only looks beautiful, it’s user friendly, it’s clear, and it’s very effective. The CourseLeaf team also goes above and beyond at every step of the way. We feel supported, even years after implementation and the transition to support.” says Daddona.