Student Activity Tracking in RE?

Mary Sanders

We are a K-12 independent school and use RE for soliciting parents, grandparents, alumni, etc.  Our Development/Advancement group would like to solicit alumni based on activities they were involved with when they were students at the school. For example, we are having a special Homecoming event in the Fall and would like to invite all alumni who either played football or cheered for football when they were students.  We have some of that information in Education Edge but don't have a good way to get it into Raiser's Edge. We are brainstorming how best to input and track this data in RE going forward.  Any suggestions or information on how you track this information in RE would be appreciated.

Karen Stuhlfeier

I use attributes in the education tab of RE. I have different categorises set up for different types of activities such as athletics and fine arts. We also put what awards students received there.

Carolyn Moatz

We also use education attributes on the student/alumni record. It works well and is pretty easy to query on. It doesn't sync with EE, so you'll need to do exports and imports to update.

Mary Sanders

Carolyn Moatz:

We also use education attributes on the student/alumni record. It works well and is pretty easy to query on. It doesn't sync with EE, so you'll need to do exports and imports to update.

What "ID" do you use to match the EE student record with the RE student record for the export/import?  

Alan French

I hadn't thought about using education attributes, that's given me something to consider! We currently use organisation relationships with a relationship/reciprocal of Club/Member, which has the advantage that we can record specifics about their position (e.g. if they were team captain, vice president, treasurer etc.) but it does have the disadvantage that we either have to create and link organisation records for each of the student societies, or deal with inconsistencies in the way the society name is entered. Also it's a pain in the butt distinguishing them from clubs and societies that the constituent is/was a member of after leaving uni.


My only worry with using education attributes is that some of our constituents have MANY education records and that the attributes could end up scattered across all of them, but I suppose that would mainly be an issue if you were actually in the record rather than querying.

Colleen Jones

We are higher ed, but also use education attributes to track student activities, sports, Dean's List, study abroad, awards, etc. Many alumni have multiple ed relationships, but the first degree they earn from here is always flagged "Primary Alumni Information", usually BA's, and that's were the ed attributes go.  All other degrees, from here or from other institutions, are just ed relationships, not primary.  We query on Primary Alumni Information to get those attributes

Colleen Jones

Mary Sanders:

 

Carolyn Moatz:

We also use education attributes on the student/alumni record. It works well and is pretty easy to query on. It doesn't sync with EE, so you'll need to do exports and imports to update.

What "ID" do you use to match the EE student record with the RE student record for the export/import?  

The student side is Ellucian Datatel, and we import those student ID into our Raiser's Edge with the student data.  Same for faculty/staff record IDs from HR (also Ellucian). We take the time to reconcile between the systems for current students and their IDs each semester. 

 

 

Patti Hommes, bCRE-PRO

I use constituent attributes and have found that to work very effectively. I have "Sports and extracuricular activities" for the students and  "Volunteer activities" for parents, grandparents etc (Coaches, class parents, etc)

Gina Smith 2

We also use Education Attributes.  We mark our own school as  "primary alumni information" on the relationship record for all our alumni/current students.  Examples of our education attributes are:


Category - Fine Arts

Description - Theatre, Band, Choir


Category - Athletics

Description - Football, Volleyball, Basketball, Soccer


Category - Academic Awards

Description - Valedictorian, Salutatorian, etc.


Since we started using these, we added the procedure of adding these into the education attributes into our "end of year processes" for alumni.


We use NetCommunity and reach out to alumni from years past before we tracked these.  They are available to use on the profile update that the alumni completes.  We have done this to accomplish exactly what you mentioned about reaching out to specific groups for homecoming, special events, etc.


I think using Constituent Attributes would work just as well.


Hope this helps.


 

Colleen Jones

We've designated ed attributes for student-related entries only.  Once they graduate and become alumni, we track their 'activites' (involvment with their alma mater) on the Volunteer tab (speaker, intern host, committee memberships etc.) or Events, to track attendance at alumni events.  It is a distinct line, with the exception of induction into Phi Beta Kappa, which can happen post-degree.  That is always an ed attribute, but it has a date for reference to know when it happens after graduation.

Christine Cooke 2

Been there done that!.  We put all of the activities/clubs/awards won while attending your school -- in the Educationi Attributes for your school.


Categories for: Clubs, Athletic Teams, Awards given by school, Awards given by outside entities.

Description :  the name of the club, team, award

Comments: the School year (using xxxx-xxxx) so you know which year they were involved.


If they are involved for multiple years, the info is entered for each year.


Handy dandy, easy to pull.  And contained within their Prime Alum Education record.

 

Patti Hommes, bCRE-PRO

Patti Hommes:

I use constituent attributes and have found that to work very effectively. I have "Sports and extracuricular activities" for the students and  "Volunteer activities" for parents, grandparents etc (Coaches, class parents, etc)

Now that I'm reading all of these great ideas, I'm having second thoughts about using constituent attributes and think education attributes are the way to go. This came up this week when I wanted to run a list of Parents with Students currently on a Squash Team. Having  "Squash - Boys Varsity" in the "Sports and extracurricular activities" attribute on the Student CONSTITUENT record did not help one bit. Constituent attributes are not an option in querying Relationships. Since I am relatively new to Education, I have lots of new things to learn and I Love It!!

Sandra Ross

Same here and to make it easier, after
graduation each year we export what data we need from Education
Edge and create an import to RE (Primary
Education/Attributes….)

Categories we use are: Athletics,
Activities/Clubs and Honors/Awards.  We use a table (has all
the sports by level, awards, etc.) for the description and we add
the year of participation in the comments.

For sports, if they won an award such as
“All-State Quarterback” we add that in comments along with the year
2015-16.  You can then easily query to group together to use
elsewhere in RE.

 

---------------

Sandra Ross

Database Manager

Virginia Episcopal School

400
VES Road · Lynchburg, VA 24503

434.385.3634
(office) 

Website:  www.ves.org

 

Guiding Students Toward Full
Stature

 

Maire Moriarty

Alan French:

I hadn't thought about using education attributes, that's given me something to consider! We currently use organisation relationships with a relationship/reciprocal of Club/Member, which has the advantage that we can record specifics about their position (e.g. if they were team captain, vice president, treasurer etc.) but it does have the disadvantage that we either have to create and link organisation records for each of the student societies, or deal with inconsistencies in the way the society name is entered. Also it's a pain in the butt distinguishing them from clubs and societies that the constituent is/was a member of after leaving uni.


My only worry with using education attributes is that some of our constituents have MANY education records and that the attributes could end up scattered across all of them, but I suppose that would mainly be an issue if you were actually in the record rather than querying.

Hi Alan,


Very cool idea about a relationship - I could never have come up with that on my own! You mention one drawback is having to choose between having an organization constituent record for each club or having each alum with it's own non-constituent relationship record, risking inconsistency. Would leaving the club as a non-constituent record and linking it to multiple alumni be a happy medium? When you add the new relationship to an alum, and search for someone to link it to, there is a new check box at the bottom of the search screen to "display non-constituents." Then, if the relationship has been added on another constituent's record, you can associate it with the same non-constituent record without having to create a new organisation.


If you're into KB articles, this one mentions that option in step 5 - and links to another swell article that might be of help.


Good luck and let me know if you've got any follow up!


Maire

Alan French

Would leaving the club as a non-constituent record and linking it to multiple alumni be a happy medium? When you add the new relationship to an alum, and search for someone to link it to, there is a new check box at the bottom of the search screen to "display non-constituents." Then, if the relationship has been added on another constituent's record, you can associate it with the same non-constituent record without having to create a new organisation.

Can I just say, albeit very belatedly as I've just stumbled across your response while trawling through my old emails, THANK YOU for suggesting this - I had never noticed the "display nonconstituents" check box before! That is going to be so useful and save me a whole bunch of time. BB should highlight that check box with flashing lights and glitter cannons

Jane Owsley

We currently have all student activities, including athletics under Constituent Attributes, but I really like the idea of shifting to Education Record Attributes under the Primary Education Relationship.  It would concentrate all of the 'student experience/alumni' details with their degree info et al, and would keep the Attribute tab more specialized for tracking other things (contact rules, planned giving clubs, etc.).  


For segmented mailings, however, people would have to possibly pull criteria from two places to capture the right group - it would have to be an interanal decision, but I'm going to present this idea to our process team.  Thanks so much for all of the great suggestions and feedback!

Jane