Overview
Academic Planning is an add-on module within SS&E that requires setup by SS&E staff along with the institution's staff. Academic Plan Term Statuses will be added at no cost to institutions that already use Academic Planning.
To add Academic Planning to your Watermark Student Success & Engagement product suite, please open a support ticket or reach out to your client success representative.
The objective of Academic Plan Term Statuses is to allow institutions to track students with an approved academic plan and display how students are following their academic plan. For example:
- How many students from specific populations are on plan or off plan in the current term?
- Which students from specific populations are on plan or off plan in the current term?
- How many students from specific populations display as on plan in the past n terms?
- How many students from specific populations display as off plan in the past n terms?
The Academic Plan Term Status will display on the student's Academic Planning page and on reports using the new Academic Planning Report Source.
The Academic Plan Term Status will display on each term that is on a student's academic plan.
- The Academic Term Plan Status options are: On Plan, Off Plan, No Status
- When a student is "Off Plan", only a staff user with permissions to academic planning can change the Academic Term Plan Status to "On Plan". Requiring a manual change ensures validation of the "off plan" status and that the student has fulfilled the requirements allowing them to be back “On Plan".
Definitions
The following definitions will help track students Academic Plan Term Status for each term that is included on the student's academic plan.
On Plan
A student is considered “on plan” if they have registered for all the courses that were added to their plan within a specific term.
Off Plan
A student is considered “off plan” if they have not yet registered for a course that was added to their plan within a specific term.
- Students are always "off plan" when they are between terms.
No Status
Upon implementation, all existing and new academic plan term statuses will be set to "No Status" by default.
- There is a configuration setting that will hide academic plan term statuses and the academic plan term "status summary" On-Plan Status from students viewing their academic plan. This will allow institutions to set it up correctly before sharing with students.
Current Term
The current term represents a term where the current date is between the term’s start date and end date.
Student Population
A student population represents a group of students that the organization is interested in grouping together for the purposes of reporting or targeted actions.
Academic Plan Term "Status Summary" On-Plan Status
The Academic Plan Term "Status Summary" On-Plan Status is set to “Off Plan” if any academic plan term status on the student’s academic plan is set to “Off Plan”; otherwise it will display “On Plan.”
Permissions
Any staff user with access to the student's academic plan will be allowed to change the Academic Term Plan Status on any term. When changing the Academic Term Plan Status status, users may enter an optional comment.
- We recommend using comments to track information that will be useful when reviewing what discussions and reasons led to the status change.
- Any academic plan term status can be changed, this is not limited to the “current" term.
- The status change and optional comments will display for anyone with access to the academic plan history.
Use Cases
Off Plan Alert
The Off Plan alert is an automated sent when a student has at least one course on their academic plan on a current term that doesn’t have a corresponding course enrollment.
The system matches up courses on the student's academic plan to the student's enrollment records imported from the SIS via the Transcript Course data feed by matching:
- The academic term
- The course section ID
- The credit value
When the Off Plan Alert generates an automated alert for a student, the system will now automatically change the academic plan term status for the associated term to “Off Plan” (if not already Off Plan). In addition, the Academic Plan history will show that the system created an off plan alert and, if applicable, changed the Academic Term Plan Status to “Off Plan" (as seen in the Planning History screenshot above).
NOTE: The system will never automatically change the Academic Term Plan Status from "Off Plan" to “On Plan” as there is no way for the the system to decide this.
Prior Off Plan Alert Limitations
We cannot assume that when an off plan alert is closed automatically or manually this means that the student is "on plan". Rather this only means that 14 days have past or the alert was closed.
Closing an Off Plan Alert
When an Off Plan alert is manually closed, there is an option to update the corresponding academic plan term status back to “On Plan.”
When an Off Plan alert is closed (either manually through the UI, or automatically after 14 days), the student’s academic plan history will display that the alert was closed.
Reporting
A new Academic Plans report source is available to display student information along with academic plan information.
This report source will provide the ability to filter on specific academic plan term(s) and student population(s). Once a report is created, it can be added to a user's Home page dashboard by selecting Edit Dashboard -> Add Content, and then searching for the report listed under "My Reports".
Aggregates on the results can help determine key metrics for academic planning, and charts can be used to help monitor academic plan statuses between student populations.
For example:
- A pie chart can display the number of students who are "On Plan" vs. "Off Plan" in the current term.
- A bar chart can represent the number of students who are "On Plan" in each individual bar/term.
- A bar chart can representing the number of students who are "Off Plan" by term.
Academic Plans - UI Additions
Enhanced Student Search Criteria
Search criteria will allow staff users to find students based on their On Plan/Off Plan academic plan status.
"All" Menu Item
The “All” menu item displays on the staff users "Plans" page.
The All menu will display all students with academic plans that are permitted for the logged in user.
"Off Plan" Menu Item
The "Off Plan" menu item displays on the staff users “Plans” page.
The Off Plan menu will display any students in any academic plan term that are assigned an “Off Plan” status.
Academic Plan History Tab
From the "Plans" page, viewing an academic plan detail screen will open on a "Plan" tab. Selecting the "History" tab will display the academic plan history.
