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Did you know that the average mousepad is eight and three quarters by seven and a half inches?
After a gap in publication during the annual frenzy of Assessment Committees and Examination Boards, welcome to the slightly late and some what thin July 2010 edition of the SAINT Newsletter. At the time of writing the preparations for Clearing are in full swing and applicant processing is underway; various issues arising from the upgrade have been sorted out and preparations for annual leave coincide with the travel stories, sunburn and strange foreign cakes / sweets of those returning from their jollies.
We would like to help keep SAINT Users better informed about our work so if you can think of an item for inclusion in a later edition then please get in touch. What would you like to know?
The SAINT system has been upgraded recently and it seems to have caught a few people unawares. It is worth remembering that it is essential that the SAINT system is upgraded twice a year so that new system functionality and system developments can be implemented. This is in addition to the system changes that reflect any changes to the UCAS application proces, Clearing or the ever changing external reporting requirements. The upgrades occur in the 'IT at Risk' periods which are usually the last week of July and the last week before the Christmas break, in December.
The details are published on the SAINT website, in the SAINT newsletter and via LSS. Please make sure that you flag these dates in your diary as they are usually agreed a long time in advance.
Provisional dates of update to SAINT Live (subject to confirmation with SITS/Tribal): 20th/21st December 2010 and 25th/26th July 2011.
Prompted by queries from several users, the flags for students repeating modules with attendance have been reviewed.
RA |
This code will be used whenever a student is repeating a module with attendance, regardless of whether they will be repeating an entire stage or just specific modules. PIT codes will distinguish between students repeating an entire stage with attendance and students repeating specific modules with attendance. This flag will close the SMR record (i.e. turn it to status COM); a new SMO and SMR record will need to be set up for the student in the following academic year. |
RG |
This code will be taken out of use. |
RN |
This code will be taken out of use. |
If the student has mitigating circumstances that have been accepted, the attempt number will need to be rolled back manually on the new SMR.
Some students will be repeating the whole year but will have modules they have passed. In order for them to have access as required to Blackboard for these modules, they DO NOT need a new SMR row for that module. See below.
Students who are repeating the year with attendance and who wish to attend the sessions for modules that they have previously passed should inform their School that they wish to do so. The responsibility for informing the School lies with the student and they should be advised accordingly. The student SMR record for the year in which they have failed the module will need to be amended to enable the module materials to be made available to them on Blackboard in the next year. This word / pdf document explains how to do this.
The SAINT Team and ASSU have been working on a list of over 1200 modules that have not had any students on them for 2 years. This was circulated to academic schools and they have indicated the modules that they wish to keep (around 330 of them) leaving 879 to be removed from the module catalogue. These have now been taken out of use and MAV records deleted for 2009/0 and 2010/1.
Work has been ongoing to identify in SAINT the students who should be charged for undertaking supplementary assessments (due to missing th eoriginal assessment without prior notification and/or without good cause). Invoices will be sent out this week.
Although the final details have yet to be ironed out, with Chris Toft retiring, ASSU staff will be subject to a restructure. The SAINT Team will be moving, quite probably to The HUB. Once the details have been worked out I will obviously let everyone know the new structure.
In the coming year, the SAINT Team intend to carry out a review of documents on the SAINT website, updating things as necessary and pruning the outdated, superfluous and unnecessary. We may contact you later in the year for suggestions for inclusion / review and for your opinions on how we should publish them so you can find what you are looking for. At the same time, we will be reviewing our training courses and will be contacting users directly to help ensure everyone gets the support and training they need.
You can contact us by emailing saint@bradford.ac.uk or by calling the ICTServiceDesk on x3333.
