Report to the Lane Community College Board
LASR Project
February, 2002

The project is on schedule and within budget. 

PRODUCTIVITY SOFTWARE
Part of the LASR budget is for the purpose of purchasing additional software that works with Banner to enhance functionality.  One example of this type of software is eVisions, which uses standard Banner output to create professional and attractive forms, such as invoices, purchase orders and transcripts.  This company works exclusively with Banner, and eVisions clients regularly share forms templates they develop. The LASR Implementation Management Team (LIMT) attended a demonstration for this software on January 14, and has made a decision to purchase it.  eVisions is very flexible, easy to use and will significantly reduce or even eliminate the need for Computer Services to customize Banner output to fit Lane forms, which will save significant amounts of time and money.

Another example of productivity software that works with Banner is called Schedule/Resource 25.  This product optimizes the scheduling of facilities, so that the college can make better use of available space.  A demonstration of this software is scheduled for February 11.  Staff most familiar with scheduling issues have been invited to join LIMT for this demonstration.

DATA STANDARDS
Large administrative software systems usually have some sort of data structure that is separate from the transactional data and the student/employee/vendor data to control how the system operates or to define valid values for a particular field.  Banner uses tables for this purpose, and because it is an integrated system, there are a large number of tables that are shared by two or more systems.  This is significantly different from the COCO system, where each functional area maintained its own tables to control system performance.  In addition, all the functional areas share many of the actual data fields such as name, address and birth date.  There is a need for all the users of the data and the system to agree to a defined set of data standards.

LIMT has identified a team to work on development of these shared data standards.  Members are Stan Barker, Helen Garrett, Linda DeWitt, Linda Simmons, Mary Glenn, Bert Ewing and Sylvia Sandoz.  The Data Standards Team met twice in January and will continue to work on the data standards agreements and documentation.  Some of this work will become a part of the training for system users as the various modules ìgo liveî.

FINANCE
Accounting is continuing to define and enter Lane's new chart of accounts.  They are meeting individually with departments to make sure that the chart will handle accounting for expenditures in ways that make sense to the departments, and at the same time will maintain the college's interest in being able to compare similar activities across the chart structure. Accounts Payable is working on cleaning up Lane's current vendor list in preparation for entering vendor information into the Banner system.  Purchasing is working on developing purchasing codes and classifications as well as routing and approval queues to support the purchasing process.  The next configuration visit will focus on grant and contract accounting.  The Finance ìgo liveî date is July 1, 2002.

HUMAN RESOURCES
The Human Resources Team completed their third series of three-day configuration sessions on January 31.  The staff have successfully completed the rule and validation tables required to date for the applicant tracking modules and are now working on tables for benefits and deductions.  Payroll training is scheduled for March 2002.  The Banner HR System will be fully implemented and ready for use by all College employees on January 1, 2003.

STUDENT
The Student Core Team has completed its first week of training with SCT trainer, Joan Bjerke.  This team meets weekly to complete assignments in preparation for future trainings and to review current processes as they apply to the functionality of Banner.  The role of the Student Core Team is to learn all aspects of Banner Student functionality, to evaluate current work processes, to design a Banner Student implementation for Lane that best uses the features of Banner and reflects Lane's goals and to represent all aspects of the college in this implementation process.  The team will involve additional Lane staff with functional expertise, beginning with the first task of defining Lane's complete curriculum in the Banner system.  This information will then be used as the basis for developing a term class schedule, the catalog and class schedule publications, student registration and faculty teaching assignments.  The Student system will ìgo liveî for the 2003-2004 academic year.

For more information about the project, contact Linda DeWitt, Ext. 3006, or visit our web site at http://2011sitearchive.lanecc.edu/lasr/.  For more information about a specific system, contact the following staff:

 Finance   Stan Barker, Ext. 5608
 Human Resources Linda Simmons, Ext. 5313
 Student   Helen Garrett, Ext. 5686