Upper Midwest Associate Registrars and Admissions Officers
(UMACRAO) conference: visit the "University of Okoboji"
On November 7 through November 9, 2007, Registrar
and Admissions representatives from over 100 higher learning
institutions across Iowa, Minnesota, North Dakota, and South Dakota
will come together to attend sessions on topics ranging from
planning commencement ceremonies, to PeopleSoft user groups. At its
core, the UMACRAO Annual Conference provides the opportunity to connect
with colleagues and share best practices. One of the most popular best
practices is "laughter."
Current UMACRAO President and University of
Minnesota Office of the Registrar Associate Director Tina Falkner
says the annual conference is a great way for those who work in higher
education to not only learn from each other, but also to have fun.
"My favorite part of the conference is the business
meeting lunch, not because of (the food), but because people talk to
each other. There's usually a lot of laughter."
This year's conference may be even more humorous
than usual; it's being held at the fictitious "University of Okoboji"
in Okoboji, Iowa. The "university" was dreamed up in 1970 by three
brothers who created t-shirts with an "official" university logo.
Despite its non-existence, the "university" name has managed to stick,
likely due to the laid back atmosphere of this tourist-attracting
locale.
The themes of this year's conference will draw
strongly from the "University of Okoboji" tradition: Class of 2007:
Accelerate Your Learning will include a "freshman mixer" (the
opening reception), a "spring formal" (the banquet), and "graduation"
(the closing speaker).
All the fun and learning enjoyed by UMACRAO
participants help forge great working relationships, leading to
resources that improve how Academic Support Resources (ASR) serves
students, Falkner says.
"If I have a question about something, I know people
in Iowa and South Dakota who I can e-mail for an answer."
Announcing two new enhancements to instructors' "My Classes" report
Information Management Systems (IMS) has made two
enhancements to the My Classes report. This report shows instructors
the list of classes for which they are assigned an instructor role
(primary, secondary, TA, or proxy). The enhancements include:
1. Instructors for summer courses will now
immediately see their summer term classes when they open the My Classes
report. In the past, the displayed term defaulted to "fall" after
spring term ended, and summer term instructors had to select the summer
report each time.
2. Instructors can now see information about classes
that do not have enrollment. A new filter box called "Enrollment
Status" was added to the report header. The default view option is
preset to display classes with enrollment. Instructors may now choose
to see all classes or just classes without enrollment by changing the
selection in this box and hitting "submit."
Please read the revised help document for more
information about My Classes. You can get to the help document by
clicking the blue "i" icon next to the report title on your home page
or above the header once you've rendered the report.
If you have questions, please contact IMS Support at
612-301-4357, option #4 (available M-F, 8:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m.) or at
reports@umn.edu.
Academic Support Resources (ASR) introductions
This month we have three new ASR employees to
introduce:
Diane Ashby returns to ASR as a Business Analyst in
the Office of Student Finance. Diane has also worked in OIT and IT
Honors. Her degrees are in Education and in a former life, Diane was a
high school English teacher. She is originally from northeastern Iowa
(trout stream country) which she calls "beautiful" but claims the
weather there is terrible. Welcome, Diane!
Emily Wolf is a new One Stop Counselor in Fraser
Hall. Emily graduated from the University of Minnesota this spring with
a degree in biology. You may recognize Emily; she worked as a One Stop
office assistant during her time as a student. Emily grew up in Mandan,
North Dakota, but has developed into a "real Minnesotan," saying her
hobbies include Minnesota Twins games and Gopher football. Emily is
happy to be able to continue working in the One Stop office. Welcome,
Emily!
Our other new employee is also a familiar ASR face;
Alexa Trussoni worked as an office assistant in the Office of the
Registrar during her time as a student ad the University. Alexa
graduated in May 2006 with a degree in professional journalism. Prior
to working in ASR, she worked at KSTP-TV in St. Paul and KWQC-TV in
Davenport, Iowa. She is originally from La Crosse, Wisconsin and is a
fan of Gopher Basketball. Welcome, Alexa!
This month in the year...
1971: University of Minnesota, Crookston offered
their first summer session classes. Two four-week sessions included
classes in the agricultural, business, and general education divisions
of campus.
1978: the the Board of Regents first approved
reciprocity with South Dakota, a practice they had already established
with North Dakota and Wisconsin.
1984: students began being charged $5 for a new
UCard should theirs be lost or damaged beyond normal wear and tear.
Today, the price to replace a UCard is $15.
