Administration

Team to focus on strategies for continuous improvement of LionPATH

David Smith, head of DUS, appointed to lead LionPATH Governance Team

UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — Making LionPATH easier to use and more student-centered, as well as more efficient and responsive for staff and faculty, is the focus of the LionPATH Governance Team being led by David Smith, associate dean for advising and executive director of the Division of Undergraduate Studies.

Smith’s two-year appointment began July 1. LionPATH, Penn State’s new student information system, provides students access to their academic and financial records.

“David Smith has been involved in LionPATH for several years and done outstanding work,” said Nick Jones, executive vice president and provost. “As chair of the LionPATH Governance Team, David will leverage all he has learned and help us continue to improve the platform and enhance its utility across Penn State.”

The LionPATH Governance Team is building on the work by the LionPATH Implementation Committee, which was led by Robert Kubat, University registrar and assistant vice president for Undergraduate Education.

With the transition to LionPATH fully implemented, Smith said the focus now will be on looking at ways to further enhance the system to support the needs of students, staff and faculty.

“The more seamless we can make interactions in LionPATH, the better we will serve our students, staff and faculty across the University,” Smith said.

Identifying needs and requests for efficiency is part of an overall effort to be strategic about determining what should be addressed and the best way to tackle any necessary changes. The team also will be preparing for future updates to the software system.

“Now that we’re live with LionPATH, the governance committee is really concerned about what’s working well and what isn’t working as well, how we should assess and determine which areas need immediate attention, and how we should prioritize needs to address the most pressing issues,” Smith said.

As part of this evaluation process, the team has been gathering input from constituents about what is not working optimally and assessing those needs. That includes prioritizing and looking at what types of changes can be put in place immediately and considering longer-term improvements. With recent changes to improve the user experience for students, the committee also will discuss how best to ensure that concerns voiced by other user groups are adequately prioritized as enhancements to LionPATH in the future.

Other changes will focus on streamlining the user experience for staff. For example, the committee is looking at what types of tasks require more manual effort now than before and whether changes can be made to address those issues. For example, summer student aid awards currently need to be manually processed by staff.

The team has been gathering feedback and requests on the LionPATH support website, http://lionpathsupport.psu.edu/. Additionally, an updated version of the LionPATH software, Oracle’s PeopleSoft Campus Solutions, is being rolled out and the University will be making initiating that update as well. Smith said the update will have a minimal impact on users and will offer opportunities for the University to address some of the needs and requests for improving LionPATH. The update will allow for new functions, and the team will look at which changes the University wants to use.

“We will bring that into place in a way that’s incremental and has limited disruptions to the community as a whole,” Smith said. “The new version has features that will benefit us, so the committee will help guide the LionPATH development and maintenance team to determine which functions we should turn on sooner rather than later to make a better more effective system for users across the University.”

David Smith is the Associate Dean for Advising and Executive Director of Penn State's Division of Undergraduate Studies. Credit: Patrick Mansell / Penn StateCreative Commons

Last Updated August 18, 2017