Creating a New Role

Roles and Privileges

Your Tk20 platform has many roles preset depending on how a user will interact with the application. Examples of roles are student, faculty, Unit Administrator, and Application Reviewer. Each role has privileges so a user with the role can access the appropriate areas of Tk20 in order to complete a task.

Roles have privileges that are set according to the expected user’s needs in Tk20. As a UA, you can adjust these privileges in Administration Security Privileges to restrict or expand a user’s access. In some cases, a new role needs to be created because a user or group of users needs specialized privileges. This new role may need access to specific functionality areas, the Document Room, or running and creating reports.

Examples of Roles and Associated Privileges

In the table below, there are several roles that are common to many colleges and universities. The table also indicates the associated privileges for the roles. In the red box, note that these two roles could be combined into a single role, since the access needed for Tk20 is the same. Keeping the number of roles to a minimum is a best practice.

Also, note the roles have specific privileges regarding log-in access to other user accounts and as a Report Manager for running Instant Insight Reports (IIR). You will need to determine if your roles require these privileges. You may also need to align users to the organizational hierarchy so they can access specific Next Generation reports. Please contact a Tk20 consultant for more information, and also read the Help Desk User Guide for Organizational Security in Reporting.

Creating a New Role

Once you have determined that you need to add a role, the next steps are to create and name the role. 

• In Administration Security Roles, select “Create New Role.”

• Next, name the role.
• If this role will be uploading documents frequently, enter an amount in “Disk Space.” Anywhere from 50-100 Mb is sufficient.
• There is no need to make any selections in the “Tabs” section.
• Request Access to Other Accounts setting: Set this to “Yes’ only if the role will need to access any/all user accounts.
• If you have authenticated log in, and this role’s user information will be matched by the university Active Directory through LDAP, CAS, etc., select the authentication source from the drop down menu. If you do not have authenticated log in, leave the source setting as “Local.”

• There is no need to make any selections in the “Customize Basic and Term Records” menus.
• Select “Create” at the bottom of the page when finished.

Setting Privileges

You now need to set the privileges for the newly created role. If your new role will have privileges that are similar to another role (such as Unit Administrator or Faculty), you can use the existing privilege settings to guide in you in setting the new role’s privileges. 

• Select your newly created role, and other roles for comparison:

• Select “Next.”

• Now you can compare the existing privileges for Faculty and UA with your New Role:

• At a minimum, make sure you give your New Role access to the Home menu and any associated sub-menus.
• Continue setting privileges by clicking on the menu titles just above the settings table.
• The ‘Default” radio button will determine which sub-menu the role will see when they navigate to each side menu item.
• Click “Save” when finished:

Adding a Role for Users

Now that you have created a new role and set privileges, you now need to align a person(s) to the new role.

• In Administration Users Add/Change role, search for the person.
• Select the radio button next to the user’s name and click “Next.”

• Select the Additional Role(s) for the user and then “Update.”
• Leave the user’s Primary Role setting as is.

• You will return to the user search screen where you can add the role for additional people.

You have now successfully created a role, set the role’s privileges, and added the role to a user’s profile. There is no limit to the number of roles you can add in Tk20, and there is no limit on the number of roles a user may have. A best practice is to limit the overall number of roles in Tk20 to make your job as a UA more manageable.