The Office of the Registrar will be closed at noon on Wednesday, November 27 through Friday, November 29 for the Thanksgiving holiday.
The information below summarizes the 'WesPortal: The New EPortfolio' information sessions offered to coincide with the June 2017 WesPortal Launch.
Log In: WesPortal
Problems: Get ITS Help
A video recording of an information session is available here.
- Timeline
The current Electronic Portfolio was launched in Fall 2000 and is now in need of a replacement platform. The goal has been to incorporate the best features of EP into WesPortal and add increased functionality to better respond to the needs of the Wesleyan community. The development of WesPortal began in earnest in Fall 2015. A significant part of the development has been the extensive pilot phases which solicited valuable feedback from 150+ pilot participants.
On June 1, 2017, WesPortal will become available to all Wesleyan faculty, students, alumni and staff. The new platform provides all users a single interface with full, centralized access to all links and applications.
- WesPortal Pilot Participants
The pilot participants represent a valuable cross-section of administrative offices, academic departments and student leaders. Much of the feedback offered by the piloters has been implemented and is now available. However, the WesPortal Team has been judicious when determining which enhancements were best suited for the initial launch and which are best suited for a release at a future date. The approach has been to maximize reliability and stability in WesPortal's framework. As users become more comfortable with the new technology, enhancements and additional functionality will occur.
- Goals
Ultimately, the WesPortal experience for users will improve with a clean, streamlined interface that provides access to all links and applications in a single location. For example, faculty members will no longer need to toggle between a Faculty EP and an Employee EP to perform academic versus employment tasks. Furthermore, the platform and an increasing number of applications are mobile responsive, so users will be able to complete tasks using their device of choice.
The WesPortal design will also allow functional owners to have increased control over their applications, thereby re-allocating ITS resources to enhance, redesign and create increased functionality and systems. The framework will also strengthen security and reduce the network burden during peak usage times.
- Encouraged User Behavior: Search
WesPortal is specifically designed with robust search capabilties and the use of which is the most highly recommended approach to finding a link within WesPortal. Each of the buckets will be closed by default, so users will not see all of their available links on WesPortal's home page. While users can expand each bucket to reveal links, the most efficient and effective method of finding a link is through the Search box in the header.
The search will return results of available WesPortal links by searching the name of the link and the associated keywords. WesPortal provides analytics which can be used to refine search results. For instance, the words that return zero results will be periodically researched and those words will be attached as descriptive keywords to the appropriate applications.
A WesPortal search will also perform a Wesleyan website custom search powered by Google. Going forward, many publicly available webpages will not be available in WesPortal. Therefore, users are encouraged to open those links and bookmark them in their browser for easy access in the future.
- Encouraged User Behavior: Favorites
All users are strongly encouraged to utilize the 'Favorites' functionality to organize the links that are used regularly. The favorites bucket will the be lone bucket in the left column and can accomodate as many links as the user prefers.
EDIT FAVORITES
Clicking 'Edit' will present the user with a red 'X' for each favorite. Clicking a red 'X' will remove the specific link as a favorite.
ADD/REMOVE FAVORITES
Users can add a favorite within an open bucket or search results by clicking the gray star. Users can remove a favorite within an open bucket or search results by clicking the red star.
- Encouraged User Behavior: Alert Box
WesPortal has more advanced functionality regarding 'Alert Boxes' in the header. Therefore, there will be a greater emphasis on and use of alert boxes when directing users to important information and deadlines. Users should pay close attention to these alerts, as users will be generally expected/required to take an action.
Alert Box requests should be submitted via Service-Now and will be evaluated/implemented by the appropriate individuals.
The alert boxes will be automatically open on large screens, but will be closed on smaller screens. Mobile users can click 'IMPORTANT' to display the alert box message.
DESKTOP
MOBILE
- Feature: Secondary Pages
In an effort to reduce clutter and preserve space on the WesPortal landing page, links can now direct users to a secondary WesPortal page with a number of correlated links. Users can Favorite or Search for a link from the landing page or from the secondary page. Functional owners will be able to build a page with a comprehensive list of links and applications without sharing screen space with unrelated items.
LANDING PAGE
SECONDARY PAGE
- Feature: Checklists
Buckets designated as a checklist will display links in order of the deadline with the dates displayed as headers. Users will be able to mark each task/item as complete/incomplete. Like all secondary pages, users can Favorite or Search for links in a checklist bucket.
- Feature: RSS Feeds
WesPortal also serves as a communication hub among members of the Wesleyan Community by having buckets populated via an RSS feed. The last ten posts on a blog are automatically displayed within these type of buckets. The links are searchable within WesPortal. Clicking on a link will bring the user directly to that post, but will then able to access the blog's home page.
- Get ITS Help
Users should submit Service-Now tickets to report information related to WesPortal. Within WesPortal, click/hover over the triple-line icon in the upper right and click 'Get ITS Help'. During the initial launch, it you need immediate attention regarding a time sensitive matter, please contact Paul Turenne x2352.
All input is welcomed from all employees, including but not limited to:
- Broken links
- Desired links
- Enhancement ideas
- General feedback
- Missing links
- WesPortal Team
Maria Higuera Palacio, Web Application/PeopleSoft Programmer
Kevin Kane, Applications Programmer
Darrell Lawrence, Analyst Programmer
Steve Machuga, Director of Administrative Systems
Karen Murphy, Analyst Programmer
Dan Pflederer, HRMS Functional Specialist
Barbara Spadaccini, Sr. Project Leader
Paul Turenne, Senior Associate RegistrarThe WesPortal Team extends a special acknowledgement of thanks to the following people for their leadership, vision and support.
David Baird, Vice President for Information Technology and Chief Information Officer
Joyce Jacobsen, Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs
Nathan Peters, Vice President for Finance and Administration
Anna van der Burg, Registrar