Case Studies

The USC Contracts and Grants department was struggling to maintain efficiencies in the face of a paper flow situation that threatened to engulf them. Exacerbating the problem was that to facilitate agreements and arrive at resolutions, a great deal of interaction and information-sharing with other campus entities was required.

The academic advisors working at University of Oklahoma’s College of Arts & Sciences were operating behind the times. While the students were using technology in every aspect of their lives, the college’s academic services office—which handles more than 8,000 student records—was still hopelessly ensnared in a traditional paper system, says Rhonda Dean-Kyncl, assistant dean for academic services.

Although the medical school’s old system of managing records with paper spreadsheets and custom databases was working fine, keeping things current did depend on programmer availability, says Monica Baccardax, IT project manager for the Faculty of Medicine at Dalhousie University Medical School, in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada. And even when all systems were “go,” staying on top of the paper flow was time-consuming.

John Hermes, vice president of information technology for Oklahoma Christian University, knew the school had problems. Despite a reputation as a pioneer in education technology and as a very high-tech university, Oklahoma Christian (OC) was lagging farther and farther behind in its business processes, says Hermes.