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Showing posts with label Notes. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Notes. Show all posts

Thursday, November 16, 2023

Chrome River tips & tricks

Please refer to the ASR-Administrative Support Resources guide when completing a Chrome River expense report to ensure all required information is being provided. Common problems that delay approval can be avoided in the following ways:
  • Business Purpose/Justification Standards - Explains why an expense was necessary and how the University benefits from making the purchase. This explanation should make sense to someone unfamiliar with your role.
  • Transaction Expense Types - This is the classification of what an expense is, and therefore which account code(s) will be available for use. These are most easily edited for TCard purchases in the eWallet, so verifying before adding an expense to a report is highly recommended. 
  • Correct Allocation/Chartstring - Chrome River will remember your most frequently used chartstrings, which is helpful as long as you have trained it correctly. To ensure you are using the correct chartstring, please refer to the Reimbursement EFS/Account Code Information.
  • Meal Purchases - When allowed by policy, meal purchases must identify all participants by name and affiliation to the University. Several of the meal expense types will ask for names in Chrome River, otherwise they can be listed in additional information or by attaching a PDF of a calendar invite.
  • Lodging-Room Charge - Always complete the Allowable Total field so Chrome River can calculate the amount policy allows for your travel destination. Leaving this blank will result in a compliance warning (i.e. more work for you).

Bonus Tip: Do not withdraw and resubmit an expense report in an attempt to “move it to the top of the pile.” Chrome River expense reports route based on the most recent submission date, so re-submitting without a specific reason (i.e. modification request, adding additional expenses) effectively moves the report to the bottom of the pile and can trigger new compliance warnings.

Staff recognition

Congratulations to Sophia Bunker, Husna Ibrahim, and Patience Bergman for representing One Stop Student Services and the University of Minnesota at the Institute for Student Services Professionals (ISSP) annual conference. They co-presented to colleagues across the world with their presentation on Enhancing Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) Competencies Among Student Services Professionals. It drew significant interest and provided attendees with high-quality information and practical resources to take back to their campuses. Thank you for your dedication and hard work to bring this to fruition!

Thursday, November 2, 2023

Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Committee

Celebrating Día de los Muertos

Día de los Muertos, or Day of the Dead, is a two-day celebration honoring deceased family members and loved ones. November 1 is Día de los Inocentes (Day of the Innocents), dedicated to the souls of children. The honoring of adult souls takes place on November 2. 


Rooted in Mexican and Indigenous cultures, Día de los Muertos is a celebration where Latin American families join together to visit and clean gravestones and provide offerings of food and drink on altars, known as ofrendas. Many light candles and incense, or place fresh flowers or the deceased’s favorite items on their ofrendas. Stories are passed back and forth to honor and remember the dead. 


An important distinction is that Day of the Dead should not be compared with Halloween. In fact, the commercialization of Día de los Muertos appropriates its cultural significance. Instead of buying commercially-made decorations, you can attend some local Día de los Muertos events:



Dr. Jessica Lopez Lyman, Assistant Professor in the UMN Department of Chicano and Latino Studies, explains how the UMN community can observe Día de los Muertos and support those who are celebrating. 


How does the UMN community celebrate Día de los Muertos? 

We have always created an ofrenda in the department. Sometimes, student groups create an ofrenda, too, like Mi Gente on the 2nd floor of the union. We build the altar and then during DDLM, we invite a local Danza Azteca group to come and bless the space with ceremony and teachings. 


How can UMN staff/students support those who are celebrating Día de los Muertos?

Talk about their own ancestors who have passed, and take small moments to reflect on the cycles of life. 


Join our ASR DEI Community of Practice

Subscribe to our DEI Google Group to discuss the latest news, connect with the committee, and keep up-to-date with DEI initiatives. More resources and information about the DEI committee can be found on the ASR Intranet.

Open Enrollment

As a reminder, Open Enrollment is from November 1 to November 30. It is the period when you can make changes to your benefits for the next calendar year, and is generally the only time that you can change your benefits options, unless you have a qualifying life event like marriage, childbirth, or divorce. Open Enrollment is also when the University announces benefit plan changes and biweekly contribution rates for the next calendar year. The choices you make during Open Enrollment take effect on January 1. For more information, see Open Enrollment.

Thursday, October 19, 2023

Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Committee

History of Israel Palestine conflict resources

For those who, like us, are interested in gaining a better understanding of the historical context of the Middle East and the present-day situation, we are sharing the following resources. This is nowhere near a comprehensive list, but it is a place to start:

Campus-Specific Resources

“My Role in Equity & Diversity” Workshop offered October 25
The Office of Equity and Diversity is partnering with the Wellbeing Program to offer their foundational workshop “My Role in Equity & Diversity” next Wednesday, October 25 via Zoom. If you were unable to register for this workshop this fall, this could be a great opportunity to attend and receive 250 wellbeing points!

Join our ASR DEI Community of Practice
Subscribe to our DEI Google Group to discuss the latest news, connect with the committee, and keep up-to-date with DEI initiatives. More resources and information about the DEI committee can be found on the ASR Intranet.

Staff recognition

Shout out to Paul Enestvedt and Moses Ngombe! They’ve put in a great effort on the buildout of the Admissions subject area of the Enterprise Data Warehouse, which paved the way for the new UM Analytics dashboard for Undergraduate Admissions. This replaces the New Student Enrollment Dashboard: Freshmen (NHS) report and supports admissions staff tracking progress towards enrollment goals throughout the admissions cycle. We also want to thank the rest of the Student Data Analytics (SDA) team for covering additional work as this dashboard was prioritized.

Thursday, October 5, 2023

Chrome River tips & tricks

When submitting an expense report, receipts are required for all non-meal per diem expenses $25+. It is important to attach complete receipts as every supplier formats them differently. Scanned or PDF receipts should not be missing pages, and pictures of receipts should not be cropped because it could exclude transaction information.

Meet the ASR Data Engineering team

Although the ASR Data Engineering team has been up and running for a while, we haven’t taken the time to introduce ourselves, tell people what we’ve been working on, or how to connect with us for work requests. The ASR Data Engineering team finds, gathers, and monitors data from our various data sources for use by ASR staff, applications, and vendors.

Team Members:
  • Ian Whitney— dedicated team member
  • David Norman— informal team member splitting time with SR-IT

Examples of recent projects:
  • For the Classroom Scheduling and Distribution Summary report, we worked with Student Data Analytics to deliver the report data.
  • With the launch of Coursedog we wrote a pipeline that extracts new Course, Program, and Proposal data every 10 minutes to support all existing integrations with the now-retired PCAS and ECAS systems.
  • For the uAchieve encoding staff, we delivered an automated, weekly report that uses Coursedog data to tell them what needs to be updated in uAchieve.
  • For the Application Development team, we created a tool that lets them automatically monitor the health of their databases and creates TDX tickets when a problem needs to be fixed.

Stay Connected
To help folks learn about what we’ve accomplished and what work is planned, we will be emailing a monthly Data Engineering Status Update to directors and stakeholders.

Do you have data that you currently have to retrieve manually? A report that you need to generate by hand? Need to get data from one system to another? Would you like to receive the monthly status updates? Contact us or submit a work request by emailing asr-data-eng@umn.edu.

Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Committee

Free October opportunities you might have missed

A Dream Beyond One’s Self
October 5 - Nov 26, Coffman Memorial Union, Second Floor Gallery

For many first-generation students, attending college not only accomplishes their dream but their families' dreams as well. A Dream Beyond One's Self shows how these students are a testament of strength and perseverance, serving as role models to themselves, their families, and their communities.

Step By Step: An Intro to Stepping Workshop with Step Afrika!
October 9, 6:30 - 7:30pm, Prodeo Academy

This assembly-sized introductory workshop is 60 minutes of highly energetic, percussive unity in motion. Participants can enjoy learning step choreography and discovering how dance brings people together. The program introduces the ties between stepping, college life, and academic achievement while discovering the rhythm, physicality, and history of stepping. All are welcome! Space is limited, and registration is required.

Centering TRUTH Report Recommendations in the University’s Work
October 10, 3:00 - 4:00pm via Zoom

This year's Decolonization Roundtable discussions will focus on recommendations from the TRUTH Project (Towards Recognition and Tribal - University Healing) Report. Our first session will focus on how we can engage in the Community Input process in the search for a University president. How can we use our collective voice to help keep TRUTH recommendations central in the search process?

Additional Events

Join our ASR DEI Community of Practice
Subscribe to our DEI Google Group to discuss the latest news, connect with the committee, and keep up-to-date with DEI initiatives. More resources and information about the DEI committee can be found on the ASR Intranet.

Thursday, September 21, 2023

Reserving ASR Spaces

Several spaces in Williamson Hall 130/140 and 160 are reservable for online and in-person meetings. Before using a space, please reserve it in Google Calendar by adding a room to your meeting. Please do not use a room, even if it looks open, without reserving it first. This serves multiple purposes:
  • It ensures people are able to use the space they reserved. 
  • It’s important that we’re able to track our conference room and Zoom room utilization. 
The University is analyzing space utilization to make plans for the future, and our reservation data is critical to understanding our needs. Thank you!

Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Committee

Thank you for your service!

The ASR Diversity, Equity, & Inclusion (DEI) committee would like to recognize and thank Ian Whitney and Ingrid Nuttall as their time on the DEI committee comes to a close. Ian and Ingrid made invaluable contributions and DEI efforts in ASR while serving on the committee. Thank you both!

National Hispanic Heritage Month

September 15 marked the beginning of the United State’s National Hispanic Heritage Month, which continues until October 15. Originally observed as Hispanic Heritage Week beginning in 1968 and later extended to a month in 1988, this month is a national period of reflection and celebration of the histories, traditions, cultural diversity, and contributions of Hispanic and Latinx Americans.

This month also celebrates the independence days of several Latin American countries:
  • September 15: Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, and Nicaragua
  • September 16: Mexico
  • September 18: Chile
  • September 21: Belize

As stated in the U.S. President’s 2022 Proclamation of National Hispanic Heritage Month, “Since the beginning, our country has drawn strength and insights from Hispanic writers, scientists, soldiers, doctors, entrepreneurs, academics, and leaders in labor and government.” In that spirit, you may find some of the following material of interest this month:

Join our ASR DEI Community of Practice
Subscribe to our DEI Google Group to discuss the latest news, connect with the committee, and keep up-to-date with DEI initiatives. More resources and information about the DEI committee can be found on the ASR Intranet.

Staff recognition

The University of Minnesota Twin Cities has signed onto and been accepted as part of the College Cost Transparency Initiative. As part of this, our financial aid notice was approved as meeting the standards of this initiative with no changes necessary! So major kudos to the Office of Student Finance, the UX and Content Strategy team, and One Stop Student Services for all of their hard work over the past years ensuring that our aid notices are compliant and transparent to students about aid types and costs. Thank you!

Thursday, September 7, 2023

Staff recognition

We want to give a big shout out to everyone in ASR who stepped up during the UM Reports outage and ensured all of our stakeholders systemwide received their data, especially with it being unavailable at such a critical time of year. A lot of this work involved analyzing the data in the unavailable reports and then investigating ways to get it from other sources.

While many people have been involved in the effort, a special thanks goes to Tony Thomas, Andrew Hill, Carolee Cohen, Christopher Smith, Colleen Harms, Dan Delaney, Ian Whitney, Jack Kimmes, Marc Keaveny, Moses Ngombe, Paul Enestvedt, Rachel McKessock, Richard Toetschinger, and Sarah Hoegger.

ASR at the Homecoming parade

Please join One Stop in their annual Homecoming parade tradition on Friday, September 29, at 6:30 pm. We will march in the parade, hand out candy, and showcase our pride and spirit for the University of Minnesota. Friends and family are welcome!

No R.S.V.P. necessary, but please email Richard Campo (campo035@umn.edu) to be included on group messages about the event. Full parade details are at Homecoming Parade 2023.

Chrome River tips & tricks

When itemizing a lodging expense on an expense report, always complete the “Allowable Total” field on the “Room Charge” component. Filling this in will automatically check the amount spent compared to the per diem limit for the travel destination. Leaving this field blank will result in unnecessary compliance warnings (i.e., extra steps for you), and will require manual review of the costs before approval. Bonus Tip! Lodging itemizations do not need to be broken out by date, but can be submitted as category subtotals for the entire stay.

When finalizing a purchase, please be aware of any sellers that offer and/or include an automatic round-up for charity. While it can be good to support various causes, the University is prohibited from making charitable donations, so these cannot be included when the University is paying (e.g. PCard, TCard, or reimbursement) for the purchase. This type of expense must be removed from expense reports before approval.

Thursday, August 24, 2023

Office of Student Finance

  • We are rolling into the fall 2023 financial aid and disbursement season! We are just as excited as everyone else to welcome new and returning students back to the Twin Cities campus. We are thankful for all of the work done around ASR to begin yet another successful year.
  • As you are all likely aware, the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) released a decision regarding race based practices being used in admissions. The Office of Student Finance is working closely with the Office of Undergraduate Education, Office of Equity and Diversity, Office of Admissions, Office of General Counsel, and University Relations on determining how this decision will impact the University of Minnesota system. A recent article from Inside Higher Education outlines some of the challenges ahead for higher education institutions.
  • Systemwide FAFSA Simplification working groups are going strong and making decisions for the 2024-25 changes. Information for students and families has been posted to the One Stop website.
  • Undergraduate and Loans Unit
    • Aid year 2022-23 has wrapped up and staff are working on closing out their financial aid programs. At the same time, we are gearing up for 2023-24, making aid adjustments and certifying loans in preparation for financial aid disbursement on Monday night August 28, 2023.
    • Due to the change in the 13-credit tuition policy, Twin Cities/Rochester Undergraduate students who decrease their enrollment to fewer than 13 credits may receive a tuition adjustment during the first two weeks of the term. Starting with fall 2023, full-time students who drop courses below 13 credits, are receiving certain types of financial aid, and have a credit balance, will have a temporary hold placed on their student account. This hold will ensure a refund is not immediately issued in cases when a student may be swapping courses, and allow OSF time to notify students that if they remain enrolled in fewer than 13 credits they may owe a balance on their account once their financial aid has been adjusted. 
    • Starting in fall 2023, the financial aid late enrollment appeal form will no longer be needed if a student adds credits after census. OSF will be running a weekly query for all careers to identify these students. Financial aid eligibility will be reviewed/adjusted accordingly. All the same aid rules still apply. 
    • OSF has updated our Satisfactory Academic Progress (SAP) email communication to students. The first sentence in the email was designed to notify the student of their SAP status and if they need to complete an appeal. A link to the appeal is provided (if applicable) with more detailed information in the email. In the past, the email had an attachment with the detailed information. It is our hope that more students will read this text and understand if there are any next steps needed to qualify for financial aid. Thank you to Meghan (OSF - Undergrad), Tom (FA-IT), and the many others that helped review the communication. 
    • The American Indian Scholars Program, a new program announced by the Minnesota Office of Higher Education, will be implemented for 2023-24. Information has been added to the One Stop website and the system-wide implementation team is being led by Kari Ellering.
  • Compliance, Graduate Unit, Athletics, Professional and Scholarship Unit (CGAPS)
    • The CGAPS units continue to make manual adjustments on financial aid packages for our populations, based on scholarships and grants that are being added to students’ financial aid packages.
    • Medical School financial aid kicks off our disbursement processes this week, and we are excited to work with students as they begin/continue their medical careers.
    • Athletics, FA-IT, and OIT are working through an error with the NCAA Compliance Assistant software that started with a system upgrade on May 1, 2023. This upgrade introduced many changes including the reporting to PeopleSoft, and is impacting work done in multiple offices. For now, a manual workaround has been identified, however we are determining if that workaround meets all team needs.
  • Fiscal Unit
    • The Fiscal Unit welcomes our newest team member, Bounmee Yang, to the team! Bounmee serves as a Finance Professional 4 supervisor. Bounmee’s first day was August 21, and we are thrilled to have him on board!
    • Here is the fall aid and credit balance disbursement schedule:
      • Monday, August 21: Medical School initial financial aid disbursement.
      • Wednesday, August 23: 1st batch of credit balances run for direct deposit.
      • Friday, August 25: 1st batch of credit balances run for checks.
      • Monday, August 28: All other TC careers initial financial aid disbursement 
      • Wednesday, August 30: 1st batch of credit balances run for direct deposit and parent checks.
      • Friday, September 1: 1st batch of credit balances run for checks.

The Capital Project Management project website is live

Hello, Fraser Hall - Chemistry Undergraduate Teaching Laboratories Enthusiasts! The Capital Project Management project website is now live. On this site, you will find periodic construction updates, photos, important campus impacts such as building outages and traffic information, the schedule, as well as a webcam (coming soon). It also includes the new building renderings and basic project information.

Campus Codefest

Over 40 University developers gathered together at Wilson Library for Campus Codefest August 17-18. Developers pitched a range of projects for attending developers to choose from. In all, there were approximately 10 different projects.

The Application Development team attended both days and split up to work on several projects. Developers then had a chance to demo their projects and talk about their progress, barriers and potential future work. Special thanks to Shawn Isenhart who reassembled the committee to make Campus Codefest happen after a few years off!

Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Committee

Whose Stories We Tell: Museums, Decolonization & Erasure
In an era where museums are reevaluating their collections, unearthing buried histories, and challenging problematic aspects of their past has become a call to action. With initiatives like "Museums Are Not Neutral" and exhibits such as the University of Michigan Museum of Art’s “Unsettling Histories: Legacies of Slavery and Colonialism," institutions are starting to acknowledge the often-overlooked stories rooted in colonization, Western domination ideology, and erasure. Among these narratives, one story stands out: the tale of Bélizaire, an enslaved Black or mixed-race teenager whose image was painted into a commissioned white family portrait only to be obscured later. This speaks volumes about the power of representation and erasure.

The picture challenges us to think about who is telling the story of our past, how that defines who we are and contributes to the myth-making of America, and who is included or excluded, and in this case, literally erased. Historian Katy Shannon noted, “People will know his name, they will see his face, and he will be the surrogate stand-in for so many people whose pictures weren’t painted and stories weren’t told.”

The tale of Bélizaire is an invitation to challenge the existing narratives, demand inclusive representation, and acknowledge the enduring struggles of those once relegated to the shadows. His image reminds us that history is not fixed, and those left out deserve to be seen, heard, and remembered.

Additional resources
Do you want to discuss this topic or know of other resources? Please share them with the ASR DEI Community of Practice Group (ASR DEI CoP). Not a member? See below!

Join our ASR DEI Community of Practice
Subscribe to our DEI Google Group to discuss the latest news, connect with the committee, and keep up-to-date with DEI initiatives. More resources and information about the DEI committee can be found on the ASR Intranet.

Staff recognition

A huge kudos to our ASR staff who have been working on the Coursedog project for the last two years. The new Coursedog curriculum and catalog tools launched this Monday, August 21. Congratulations to the team on reaching this HUGE milestone!

The launch of Coursedog marks a transition for our University curriculum staff from ECAS & PCAS to a single Software as a Service (SaaS) system that integrates course and program approval workflows and increases process transparency. Coursedog also feeds both course & program data into a University Catalog website that is more user-friendly and accessible for all students.

It took a lot of people to make this project possible, and a sincere thank you goes to everyone who contributed to its success. Special thanks to the following ASR staff members who helped with the Coursedog Project: Allie Cummelin, Annalee Tomsicek, Christina Herold, Christopher Abts, Christopher Smith, Dan Delaney, Danielle Eberhard, David Norman, Frank Morello, Heather Micek, Ingrid Nuttall, Jennifer Peterson, Jennifer Selander, Jessica Clem, Kate Sophia, Kathryn J. Kvam, Matt Plachejo, Max Herman, Renae Faunce, and Sara Cokl.

Several project team members will continue supporting users and ongoing development of the Coursedog product post go-live. Special shout-out to Matt Plachejo who has taken on the role of Coursedog Product Owner. Matt will continue to work with the Curriculum Administration Best Practices governance group to implement University curriculum administration decisions into the tool and provide the University community with ongoing product feature updates.