Student Success Technology

A photo of students walking at UNT.

Creating a system of engagement using technology: The SST team members manage the Salesforce constituent-relationship management environment and applications supporting UNT academic advising, admissions and marketing efforts.

Jennifer Lee, Ph.D., director, IT support, Student Success Technology, 940-369-6038, GAB, Room 110

Maureen Saringer, IT senior programmer analyst, 940-369-6059
Irene Frank, application support analyst, 940-369-6050
Karthik VakulabharanamSirpurapu, graduate student assistant
Vanessa Loza, student assistant

Service Areas

Salesforce Training: email requests for training to the SST Office. 

Salesforce or Appointment Manager User Access: to establish a new account or update an existing account, please use the SST Salesforce and Appointment Manager Account Management Request Form.

Salesforce or Appointment Manager Support: to request help with an incident or new functionality, please contact the SST Salesforce and Appointment Manager Help Desk.

About Us

In 2012, a workshop of the UNT President’s Retention and Enrollment Council identified a need to investigate IT solutions and others for improving advising including eAdvising, enterprise appointment scheduling and notes. The university had two aging legacy databases for the campus to use for advising notes – systems that needed to be replaced and enhanced to meet the current needs of advisors and other student-support professionals.

In early 2013, members of a workshop focusing on retention data generated an initiative around documentation of advising. A task force of advisors, representatives of UNT's Division of Student Affairs, and technical resources were assembled to develop a solution. The group developed a charge, created a shared vision for advising technology, refined a detailed list of requirements, and evaluated several possible solutions ranging from niche advising products to comprehensive constituent relationship management, CRM, products. The group selected Salesforce after a comprehensive and extensive search.

The overall goal of the project is to provide the following.

  • 360-degree view of a student’s academic and co-curricular activities on a single platform
  • Secure and shareable advising notes including referral and workflow capabilities
  • Imaging support
  • Online student self-service for appointments, and
  • Enablement of enhanced, targeted communications with students in support of advising and student life

The project kicked off in the fall of 2014 to provide a campus-wide, advising-notes system with basic reporting. Hosted by the UNT College of Arts and Sciences and College of Education, data from two internal databases were migrated successfully into the Salesforce platform. The system went live on April 20, 2015, with more than 200 users from all academic advising units at the Denton campus. Other user groups included the UNT Learning Center, Athletics, and Honors College. The university is expanding the presence of Salesforce from advising to a comprehensive student success system with offices of Admissions and University Relations, Marketing and Communications as the next partners.

For an update about Salesforce, read Benchmarks Online, June 2016.

Do you have a great idea about information technology? Let us know! Submit your idea today!

Top