On three separate days this spring students attempting to register for fall 2017 courses were unable to do so at their scheduled times due to technical problems with a University system. Information Resources & Technology worked around the clock to resolve the underlying issues and ultimately configured the system to function normally when registration opened for sophomores.
The problems seniors and juniors faced while trying to enroll in classes, however, were not acceptable. We have released initial information about the registration issues, but the University deserves a detailed explanation about what we’re doing to prevent similar problems in the future.
We made significant changes to the system that handles registration following registration in fall 2016 in order to maintain technical support from our vendors, create redundancy and account for the University’s current and future growth. We have determined that those changes, which included deploying a new configuration for the back-end databases that support Banner, may have contributed to the registration problems.
We have enlisted external experts to help evaluate the complex network of hardware and software that allows Banner to function in order to identify the root problem and weed it out.
As part of our multi-pronged investigation, we are internally evaluating the technical setup of our system, including each of the hardware and software components that Banner needs to operate.
Students, faculty and staff who use Banner are interfacing with an application maintained by a company called Ellucian. The information users are interacting with via the Banner application is stored in an Oracle database, which is hosted on hardware configured for Oracle.
We determined that we needed to perform major upgrades to the system that handles registration last year, and we made several significant changes including reconfiguring the Oracle databases. We also simultaneously requested an order for new Oracle hardware.
As with any new system, we were continuously evaluating this new setup and making adjustments to optimize its performance.
While new systems often integrate seamlessly into existing digital environments, occasionally weaknesses are not exposed until extreme stresses are put on the system, which was the case during senior registration for fall 2017.
The new Oracle equipment we requested arrived on campus after registration opened for the fall 2017 semester. We expect the new hardware, which requires a significant amount of preparation before it can support large-scale events like registration, will be load tested and ready to use when enrollment opens for spring 2018 classes.
We have partnered with Mythics, a consulting firm that specializes in Oracle technology, to evaluate the current configuration, identify any performance issues and recommend improvements. We will provide the University with an update after the firm completes that work, which is scheduled to be done by July 14.
We have also enlisted Ellucian to review how the Banner application functions on the new Oracle configuration.
In addition, we are evaluating our internal processes for deploying new technology in mission-critical systems in order to ensure we are taking whatever steps possible for identifying potential issues prior to launch.
As our investigation into these issues continues, we pledge to be fully transparent with the University about our findings. We are dedicated to determining the exact cause of the problems during fall 2017 registration and ensuring those problems are not repeated.