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Document Management
Image and Integrate
11/1/2007
Kofax Image Products, maker of the Intelligent Capture & Exchange suite of software. The product, he says, captures content in any paper or electronic format, from any device anywhere, regardless of the desktop platform technology. It has the ability to extract appropriate information from varied content sources, and then notifies the pertinent departments when critical information is received or when preemptive action is necessary. Now, information is not simply captured, but analyzed. Capture & Exchange follows on the heels of Advanced Capture, and will be finding its way to universities by the end of 2007, says Schaefer.The time is ripe for these kinds of systems. At Villa Julie College, just outside Baltimore, MD, the school's two campuses are 10 minutes apart, and recently, Admissions was poised to move from the Stevenson to the Owings Mills campus. Tracy Bolt, the registrar there, was concerned about what would happen to the customary paper records shuffle. She remembers asking, "How are we going to be able to share information and paperwork when we're separated?" The transfer evaluator, for instance, needed to be able to see the transcripts of accepted transfer students so that she could quickly evaluate them even prior to their entry to VJC. Other offices needed to "see" the records, as well. The answer came from AIG Technology's D3 Workflow Suite document management system, the installation of which Bolt spearheaded in October 2005.
To meet the challenge, Bolt chose two programs from the Suite—Doc e Serve (image layout, reporting, sorting, and file merging), and Doc e Scan (captures images from Doc e Serve). (A third module, Doc e Fill, routes documents for distribution and approval, and is used in other university departments, including Financial Aid and Accounting.) Utilizing the two programs, admissions materials now are scanned and electronic files are created for every VJC applicant. "It has simply been a lifesaver," Bolt declares. "Looking into the imaging system is now a part of our standard vocabulary and piles of paper are now nonexistent. Each student has [an electronic] file cabinet drawer with folders—academic advising, application, registration. Any paper data that comes through related to that student is scanned into the folder."
Although the system links various parts of the college—Registrar, Admissions, Financial Aid—access is restricted. For instance, Bolt points out that she can't see the financial aid package a student may have received, and the Financial Aid office does not have access to student information regarding disciplinary actions. The biggest benefit? "There's no file handoff anymore. It's made communication between the departments seamless," she enthuses. Still, while the AIG system has enhanced coordination, it wouldn't have been as successful if department leaders weren't already working together as a team. "‘Change' is our middle name. We were ready to hop on board with it all the way."
::WEBEXTRAS ::
The Road to Paperless: More
institutions are clearing out those
filing cabinets.
Image Management: Tightening
links between DI, online processing,
and document management
solutions.
Neal Starkman is a freelance writer based in Seattle.
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