The Book Bag : Student records

Integration Insight: Oh Records Where Art Thou?

Allison Davis — Wed, 05 Aug 2009 19:06:00 GMT

You open the linking grid and particular records are missing. Perhaps no Students appear in the linking grid or only records you linked previously appear in the linking grid. Why does this happen? There are a few factors that determine which records appear in the linking grid:

1. Integration Setup

In Set up Integration, let’s say you selected to include students with a particular status and/or grade level. You may need to cross-reference the student’s Education Edge record with your selection in the Students section of Set up Integration with The Raiser's Edge to see if the Student meets the criteria to be included in the linking grid. The same is true for Individuals who are relationships to students.

2. Filters in the Linking Grid

The Filters Button in the Linking grid is the most common culprit. Sometimes users will select particular record types to show only Faculty or only Students in the Linking Grid. When a different user looks at the linking grid, he may wonder why certain records are missing.

3. Drop-downs in the Linking Grid

Add As - In the Add As field, you can filter by Constituent or Nonconstituent if The Education Edge is the record source. If The Raiser's Edge is the record source, you can filter by Individual or Organization.

Matches - In the Matches field, you can select to show records in the grid based on matching status:

<All> - Shows all records regardless of matching status.
Any Match - Shows only records that are matched to a record in the target database based on your matching criteria.
All Unmatched Records - Shows only records that are not matched to a record in the target database based on your matching criteria.
All Unlinked Records - Shows only records not linked to a record in the target database.
Linked - Shows only records that are linked to a record in the target database.
Match - Shows only records that are matched to a single record in the target database based on your matching criteria.
Multiple Match - Shows only records that are matched to multiple records in the target database based on your matching criteria.
Academy Manager Match - Shows only records with an Academy ID that matches an Academy ID on a record in the target database.

Conflicts- In the Conflicts field, you can select to show records in the grid based on conflicts:

<All> - Shows all records regardless of conflicts.
Data Conflict - Shows only records with different values in mapped fields.
Multiple EE Match - Shows only records with more than one matching record in the Education Edge database.
Multiple RE Match - Shows only records with more than one matching record in the Raiser’s Edge database.
Multiple Address Matches - Shows only matching records with multiple address matches.
<None> - Shows only records without conflicts

Integration Insight: New Features Part 2

Allison Davis — Thu, 30 Apr 2009 19:37:00 GMT

Linking records through Integration can be a time-consuming task. It can be difficult to determine if matches are correct in the linking grid because sometimes students and parents happen to have the same names (i.e., Jr. and Sr.). Without opening their respective records, it is difficult to know which record is which. You may even see Multiple EE matches or Multiple RE matches in the Matching Records field because records have similar names.

In version 7.78, you can open and even edit records from the linking grid. In the linking grid in The Raiser's Edge, right-click on a match and open The Education Edge or The Raiser's Edge record.

Here's the open record lowdown:

Once you open the record, you can also edit information on the records such as addresses, relationships, biographical information, applications, enrollments, and history of changes.
If a particular row has multiple matches, the Open option displays the Multiple Matches so you can select the record to open.
You can only open Education Edge records from the linking grid in The Education Edge. We're working on adding functionality to open both Education Edge and Raiser's Edge records from The Education Edge linking grid in a future version.

Integration Insight: New Features Part 1

Allison Davis — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 20:19:00 GMT

Integration maps fields and relationships between two databases. The synchronization process looks at the database with the most recent update on these linked records. If the records in both programs were updated since the last synchronization, the most recently updated record wins and overwrites the other program's record.

To keep your data accurate, you should synchronize often. We recommend synchronizing, either manually or automatically, from a single workstation every 15 minutes. When your databases have not been synchronized in more than a day, you can experience issues such as overwritten data.

In version 7.78, you will notice some new prompts appearing when you manually synchronize data. This message informs you of the last time synchronization ran and our recommendations for synchronization. This will help to ensure data changes are accurately reflected in both databases.

The longer you wait to synchronize, the more likely you will lose record changes in one or both databases. Synchronization does not keep track of changes in the order in which they were made. The issue especially occurs with the sharing of address and phone data. For example:

Let's say you run synchronization twice a day, at 8:00 a.m. and 5:00 p.m. At 9:00 a.m. you change an address from 123 King St. to 123 King Street in The Raiser's Edge. At 2:00 p.m. the Registrar changes the Zip code from 29403 to 29402 on the King St. address in The Education Edge. At the 5:00 p.m. synchronization any changes will come from the database last updated; in this case, The Education Edge. This means the synchronized address will be 123 King St. with a Zip code of 29402.

Here are some important tips to keep synchronization running smoothly:

To manually synchronize data, click Synchronize Data on the Integration page.
To automatically synchronize data, you can establish settings in your Microsoft Scheduled Task Wizard application. For more information on setting up a scheduled task, see Knowledgebase solution BB211850.
We recommend that you automatically synchronize data every 15 minutes.
All of this is explained in Knowledgebase solution BB604658.

Stay tuned for the next post on new Integration features!

Merlin the Wizard: Ready to Create Your Student Progression Entries

Nate Hall — Mon, 30 Mar 2009 19:34:00 GMT

Everyone knows the good wizard Merlin portrayed in the classic Disney movie The Sword in the Stone. He was a jovial little guy willing to help young Arthur claim his throne by protecting him from all manner of ills, from hawks to larger fish. Well, one ill that many of you may be experiencing this time of year is getting your students ready for scheduling next year, and probably the most important process is creating the student progression entries for each student. Sure, these can be entered in one at a time, or you could import them all at once. But those options take a lot of time and time is money.

Well, this is where Merlin comes in. Merlin has many different jobs in Blackbaud’s school software, but one of his more useful - even if it’s only used once or twice a year - is to create the student progression entries. To do this, Merlin takes the form of the Mark for Reenrollment Wizard and this particular spell, if you will, is located in a couple of different places: it’s on the Student page in Records, in the Tools menu from the Students page, and under Status Wizards on the Administration page in Registrar’s Office. Once you locate the wizard and open it up, you’ll quickly see that this is a pretty straight-forward process, but if you need instructions for harnessing Merlin’s vast powers I’d recommend checking out Knowledgebase solution BB184652. And just one other trick, you can save the instructions easily by clicking the link for the printer friendly version and then creating a bookmark in your web browser.

Hope you are all enjoying the new Book Bag blog so far! If you’ve got any suggestions for blog topics or question/comments about the posts then post back and tell me about it! In the meantime, it’s beautiful outside and Merlin wants to go hang out in the sun.

Tips from a Troubleshooter: Advance Deposits

Sean Long — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 19:29:00 GMT

Hi everyone! I know some of you might be familiar with me already; I'm Sean, a Customer Support Analyst who handles our Education Solutions products (Registrar's Office, Student Billing, Admissions Office, NetClassroom, and Faculty Access for the Web). I talk to a lot of you regularly, and I wanted to write a quick post about one of the most common subjects I talk about on a daily basis, especially this time of year

Advance Deposits.

Advance Deposits are a type of Billing Item used to record money received at one time but realized in a different time. For instance, a student pays $100 to hold a seat in your school next year. What do you do? You have to accept that money, but how do you track it in the system without it crediting your Accounts Receivable general ledger account? You may not want to record the money as actual revenue just yet, so you'll have to hold it until next year, because the new fiscal isn't starting until 07/01/09.

Although I've talked to customers who handle this in other ways, an elegant solution to that problem is the Advance Deposit!

Let's dissect the Advance Deposit. Like any Veterinarian will tell you, a creature is the sum of its parts. Our Advance Deposit is the sum of its tabs. The Advance Deposit has tabs that describe the amount, the generation date, and the GL Distribution (maybe eventually I'll post about those other tabs, like Notes).

Open up Configuration, and click Products and Billing Items. Now open up an Advance Deposit billing item. The Generate On date (at the bottom right of the tab) and GL Distribution tab are the only things I'll discuss here, as those are special when you talk about Advance Deposits.

The Generate On date is the date you need the money realized on your books (Crediting the Accounts Receivable account) and available to pay down a student's charges (their balance). For example, if the money is supposed to pay part of the first tuition payment of the year, and your school year starts on 07/01/09, you would set the Generate On date to 07/01/09.

The GL Distribution tells the system the account to credit when the advance deposit has a payment applied to it. This would generally be a Liability account of some sort, like a Deferred Revenue account. The money would debit out of this account and credit your Account Receivable account on the Generate On date.

Make sense? Here's how you use it in practice:

I send you a $100 check. You add this in as a Payment, and in 7.77, you select the Advance Deposit you want to create at the bottom of the screen. You will also enter the amount, and select whose account you want to credit during your Generate On date. When you then save and close out of that payment, two things are created on the student's Activity tab: An Advance Deposit line, and a Payment line.

These two lines will be $100, and the student's balance will show that there was no net gain or loss. That's because the Advance Deposit acts as a charge, so that it eats up (sorry to keep the Veterinarian reference going!) the payment and holds it in Liability until your Generate On date.

When you Generate the Transactions Automatically, you will then see a third line on that activity tab: A Credit of $100. This is going to be what you use to pay my tuition, or whatever other fees I sent you my $100 for.

Cool, right? I hope that clears up some questions about Advance Deposits! Do you use them a different way or use Advance Deposits to do something really creative? Let me know by commenting below!

Happy to Help – A new Bio 2 tab checkbox for Applicant and Student Records

Lindsey Robbins — Fri, 31 Oct 2008 17:37:00 GMT

After a brief absence I’m back and more than happy to help. It’s been a busy fall especially with 7.77 releasing a couple weeks ago. Not to start back on such a downer but an important feature was added to 7.77 for student and applicant records. If a student or applicant passes away, you can now mark the Deceased? checkbox. The Age field disappears and the applicant/student no longer appears in your mailings. Not only does this help in your processing but you can show sensitivity to the relations of the applicant /student and not send letters or mailings when they are already going through such a difficult time.

On the Applicant and Student records, the Deceased? checkbox appears on the Bio 2 tab.

For more information, see the Records Guide for Registrar's Office or Records Guide for Admissions Office on The Education Edge User Guides page.

Student Billing State-of-Mind Time Saver: Manage Billing Groups

Jennifer Maroney — Tue, 23 Sep 2008 12:12:00 GMT

Here is a great time saver for those of you that need to manage families with multiple children. You can create billing groups to quickly add or update student, individual, and organization records. Manage Billing Groups, the official name of the feature, lets you add records for an entire family at one time, link the records, and copy address and billing information from one record to all the others. Linking records saves you even more time, because if you update one linked address, all linked records will automatically update; no more manually opening each record.

Without further ado let's get started:

In Administration, click Manage Billing Groups.
- To add a record using billing groups:
  1. In the drop-down list, click Add New Student, Add New Individual, or Add New Organization. The record type you select appears in the Records box.
  2. Enter biographical information in the fields on the right.
- To update an existing record using billing groups:
  1. In the Record Name field, enter the individual name or click the binoculars to locate the individual record to update.
  2. Click the down arrow next to Load all associated records and select Load only selected record. The individual's biographical information appears.
  3. Add to or edit the biographical information.
Select the Defaults tab and:
1. Click Payers to define payer information for the individual.
2. Click Statements to define statement recipient information.
3. Click Billing Defaults to add billing defaults.
4. Click Relationships to add relationships.
Select the Addresses tab to add address and contact information.
Click Finish and New to save and close the individual record and open a new billing group automatically, or click Finish and Close to save and close the individual record.

Happy group managing. Talk to you soon!

Student Billing State-of-Mind: Incorrect Charges or Credits?

Jennifer Maroney — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 15:00:00 GMT

Here's a possible scenario: You just finished running statements and realized that there are charges on the wrong records. Now what? Well, I am glad to let you know that there is an easy fix for whatever your incorrect charge or credit scenario. All you need to do is delete the charge from the incorrect record and add it to the correct record if appropriate; this process also works for credits. To delete the incorrect charges or credits:

Open the Student record and select the Activity tab.
Select Activity from the View drop-down menu.
Highlight the charge and click Delete on the action bar.

If the charge or credit has been posted, you will be prompted to enter the date for reversing entries to post to General Ledger.

Talk to you soon!