Navigating the Future of Student Information: An Overview of Tufts University's iSIS Program

Tufts University has implemented a new Integrated Student Information System (iSIS), poised to revolutionize the way students and faculty interact with academic and administrative processes. This system, replacing the quarter-century-old Student Information System (SIS), represents a significant upgrade in technology and functionality. iSIS serves as the new gateway for student information at Tufts.

Transitioning from SIS to iSIS: A Phased Approach

The transition from the old SIS to the new iSIS was carefully planned and executed in phases. In mid-April, students at the Friedman School, the Sackler School, and the School of Medicine’s Public Health and Professional Degree Programs began utilizing iSIS for fall 2013 course registration. All remaining schools transitioned to iSIS later in the spring. During the transition period, students and faculty used both the old and new systems. All students who used iSIS for course registration had access to a new “shopping cart” feature, which helped them prepare their course schedule in advance, so that when registration officially opened, they just clicked “enroll” to register.

The SIS Project team rolled out a real-time summary of a student’s financial account, including account balances, meal plans and financial aid. Transcripts were made available in August.

Key Features and Benefits of iSIS

iSIS offers a range of improvements and new features designed to enhance the user experience and streamline administrative tasks.

University-Wide Course Catalog

Among the highlights of iSIS is an online university-wide course catalog that can help students and their advisors plan curricula or careers. The system features a new online course catalog that can be viewed by the public, starting in March. The catalog is a collection of courses across the university (with the exception of the medical school’s M.D. courses) going back to 1989, so students and faculty can see the history of courses being offered now. More importantly, the catalog will help faculty in advising students.

Streamlined Registration for Dual-Degree Programs

Some of the advantages of the new system are immediately apparent: students in dual-degree programs, like those pursuing the MALD and M.S. in food and nutrition policy at Fletcher and Friedman, for example, won’t have to register for courses or check their grades in two different systems-it will all be in one place.

Enhanced Flexibility and Academic Innovation

Because all this information now resides in one place, there is greater flexibility in how it can be used and accessed. In addition, iSIS supports academic innovation. Its flexible technical architecture allows Tufts to modify and support changes in academic policy that were not possible in SIS.

Real-Time Financial Information

The SIS Project team rolled out a real-time summary of a student’s financial account, including account balances, meal plans and financial aid.

Shopping Cart Feature

All students who used iSIS for course registration had access to a new “shopping cart” feature, which helped them prepare their course schedule in advance, so that when registration officially opened, they just clicked “enroll” to register.

The Development and Implementation of iSIS

The new Integrated SIS was built for Tufts by Tufts people, with help from an implementation partner, working together for several years. The system provides “a strong new technical architecture that is ready for the future,” says Michael.

Read also: Exploring Tufts Athletics

Navigating iSIS: A User's Guide

Accessing iSIS

Students may access SIS at go.tufts.edu/sis. Every SIS page includes the universal navigation header, intended to appear at the top of every page as long as the user is signed on to the portal. In addition to providing access to the standard navigation buttons (like Home, Favorites, and sign-off) the universal navigation header can also display a welcome message for each user.

Course Selection and Enrollment

This will allow you to view courses by Program (i.e. Public Health, Professional Degree) or by Subject. From the search results you can see which courses or sections are open and available to you. Be sure to click “View All Sections” for classes that have multiple sections. To add a course to your Shopping Cart by clicking the “Select Class” button. View the "Shopping Cart: View Results" page to determine whether you were successfully enrolled in your selected classes.

Understanding Key Terminology

To effectively navigate iSIS, it's helpful to understand some of the key terms used within the system:

Academic Career: A grouping of all academic work undertaken by a student that the school groups into a single student record.
Academic Institution: A university or college that is independent of other similar entities and has its own set of rules and business processes.
Academic Plan: The field of study or curriculum pursued by the student.
Academic Program: A grouping of all academic work undertaken by a student that the school groups into a single student record. All course work that a student undertakes at an institution that is grouped into a single record.
Academic Subplan: Folder tabs at the top of a displayed page that allow movement between pages in a component.
Academic Term: A division of an academic year.
Adjustment Calendar: Controls how a student’s account is charged when dropping a class or withdrawing from a term.
Component: The lowest level of organization on the menu. Components are used for data entry, review, or to initiate a process or report. Usually these are pages that are related and need to be completed in succession.
Effective Date: The date for which the Report or Process is effective/valid.
Pagelet: Each block of content on the home page is called a pagelet.
Run Control: A run control is a type of online page that is used to begin a process, such as the batch processing of a payroll run.
Shopping Cart: All students who will use iSIS for course registration will have access to a new “shopping cart” feature, which helps them prepare their course schedule in advance, so that when registration officially opens, they just click “enroll” to register.
Wildcard: A Wildcard is a special symbol that stands for one or more characters in a search parameter. Using Wildcards enables you to select records when you do not know the full name of the search parameter or if you want to match multiple records.

Addressing Common Issues

Students have faced issues with the waitlist for the Introduction to Ethics course, but with recitations as well. Some enrolled in Kim’s ethics lecture found themselves unable to register for a recitation section - even though it is a required component of the course.

Kim noted a recurring issue that stems from a lack of clarity on SIS. Introduction to Ethics is cross-listed between philosophy and civic studies. “So the civic studies lecture has a waitlist of five and the [philosophy] has a waitlist of five,” Kim said.

Course Evaluations in iSIS

Tufts University is committed to ensuring the quality of its academic programs, its teaching and the learning experiences of its students. An important component of this is the regular evaluation of courses by students. Instructors are invited to view their response rates and encourage student participation.

Instructors can check evaluation response rates during the evaluation period. Shortly after the evaluation period is over, and after faculty have submitted grades, the reports will be generated with the student responses. At that time, invitations will go out to view course evaluation reports.

Some schools have implemented a response threshold where reports are only generated if a certain number of student responses are received. To help avoid falling short of their response threshold, instructors are invited to monitor their response rates and encourage student participation. In addition, you can access Blue via the 'Course Evaluations' link in the left side navigation of any Canvas course.

Data in the Blue course evaluation system comes from SIS. If the course evaluation period is active and you have not been invited to monitor your response rates, please reach out to your admin or registrar to have your data updated in SIS. Response rates will be displayed for all of your courses. If you have too many courses, you can search and sort as you wish. A tile will display the response rate for each course. The additional options include a QR code for the form for that specific class. Click 'View QR code' to display the code. You can take a screen shot of this code to share with the students. They will scan the code with their phone and be transported directly to the form. Shortly after the evaluation period is over, and after faculty have submitted grades, the reports will be generated with the student responses.

The Ongoing Evolution of iSIS

“This is the beginning of the beginning,” she says. “A system of this interrelatedness and complexity doesn’t come into being without a few adjustments. Between March and August 2013, students and faculty will use both the old and new systems. “During the transition, students may see their information in iSIS, but they may not be able to update it in iSIS until August, when iSIS becomes the official system of record,” Michael says.

To work with SIS is to be constantly addressing problems and aiming for improvement. Snell wants Tufts to figure out a better way to introduce SIS to incoming students, such as an introductory training session. It seems like a great idea - in fact, Tufts used to offer it. “Before COVID, we used to do the first-year registrations in person in a computer lab,” Snell said.

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