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Information to Run Your Program
July 2014
ACE Award Winner Spotlight -
Deborah Champion
At our ACEware Annual User's Conference this April, we awarded four customers with the new ACEware Champion Educator (ACE) Award for their innovative and extensive use of Student Manager at their institution. We are going to spotlight each of the award winners in upcoming newsletters.

This month, we highlight Deborah Champion, Systems Support Specialist IV at Georgia Southern UniversityACEware applauds Deb for developing a comprehensive training curriculum for all of her department's Student Manager users! This Student Manager training program is integrated into the campus LMS system and ensures users are thoroughly prepared to use the system with confidence and consistency. Users are cross-trained to ensure operations run smoothly in all situations. Kuddos to Deb and Georgia Southern University!

Deb said that she was surprised to get this award, but it means a lot to her. She said that her family is proud of her achievement.
 
"We value all the features [of Student Manager] and typically push the limit on some of the features" - Deb Champion
 
We asked Deb about advice she would offer to CE professionals. Her advice for Student Manager users: 
"Have a plan. Know how you plan to use your data. It's much easier to code the system correctly the first time than to re code the system later on. Remember, the system can only give you useful information if it's given the accurate data and coded in a way that you can extract what you need. Don't be afraid to use the system to the fullest. Student Manager is a very robust system and can do much more than most people realize or use it for."
 

Advice from Deb for people considering the use of Student Manager:

"Take the time to list the needs of your ultimate system and ask a lot of questions. In all likelihood, the system can do what you need.  I've found very few things that we've needed that the system can't do. Student Manager's flexibility is one of the key features that attracts me to the system. It can handle almost any type of program.  That's important in Continuing Education."
 

Deb's additional suggestions for success with Student Manager:

"Have a plan before implementing, invest in training your staff, maintain the data and the system and you will have a happy healthy system." 

Pictured from left to right - Doug Brower (Deb's technician from 1999 to 2008), Matthew Olson (Deb's technician from 2008 to 2013), Lindsey Lieberman (Deb's technician from 2013 to Present), Deb Champion (holding her award), and Chuck Havlicek (some guy that wanted to be pictured with all the cool people!)
MATTHEW'S CORNER (of the cabin) - Search in SM8

It slices, it dices, and it sorts! It will even resize and remember the size for next time.

 

When we started looking at making Student Manager version 8, we realized that the old find screen just was not going to convert to the new format. Stein found several examples for me to start with. I took bits and pieces from each one and put in a ton of my own ideas. The result is something like this:


 

To slice data, one just needs to begin typing in the search box. Any column with a burgundy heading with data that matches what you type anywhere in the field will be the only ones to show up. So it makes the list shorter and shorter as you type. For example, if you type "smith", you should see people with smith anywhere in the last name (e.g. Smith, Silversmith, Dasmithers, etc.) or in the first name (though I don't know of anyone with the first name of Smith) or in the firm name and so on.

 

To dice data, one just needs to hit the space key after typing their first search criteria and start typing a second word. This fires two separate searches and the results will be what matches both the first and the second word and not necessarily in the same column. For example, if you type "smith bill", you should see only people with that combination (e.g. last name Smith and first name Bill, last name of Dabillydasmith, firm name of Smith, Billions, & Associates, etc.).

 

To sort data, one just needs to click on the column heading. To do the reverse sort, click on the heading a second time. The arrow icon will change based on the direction of the sort.

 

In my image and examples, I've focused on the name find screen. This model is throughout the Student Manager 8 program. So any search for a course, catalog, instructor, firm, etc. will fire this new way of searching. It really is one search screen that rules them all. I love it as it makes things easier on me coding wise and when I use the program. I hope that you love it too.

 

Until next time,

Matthew J. Olson

ACEware Systems

Programmer
New 101 Series Recordings
To coincide with the release of Student Manager 8.0, we re-recorded our popular Student Manager 101 Series in late May. The series is divided into four categories:  Introduction, Names, Courses, and Registrations.  And this time around, we split up each of those categories into smaller, more focused topics.  You can find the new Student Manager 101 recordings on our YouTube channel:   



Coming soon. . .  to a Cloud near you!

 

Bill and Brandon, ACEware NxT programmers, stay hard at work on our SaaS "Software as a Service'' product. Every day brings new and exciting enhancements that will benefit your CE operation and your students. Did you know that NxT: 

  • is mobile friendly? Students can access course information and register with their favorite mobile device. 
  • allows customized field labels? Y-O-U control how your program forms and fields are labeled.
  • supports Google Analytics? Make data-driven decisions! 
  • manages images and documents?  Single or multiple images can be added to a course; documents can be uploaded at the class level, and pictures can enhance individual student records. 
  • allows you to work without an internal  IT staff? No local server is needed and your ACEware team takes care of details such as updates and backups. 
  • will be released on a limited, application basis on July 15?!

 

For more information, you can view an archived webinar from aceware.com/events/webinar-archive/ or contact chuck@aceware.com for a personal demonstration and to see if your unit is a good candidate for the summer 2014 release!

ACEware Training 2014-2015

 

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About Aceware
Aceware provides easy to use registration software designed for non-credit programs.  

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