Orgsync Blog

I just wanted to post  a quick THANK YOU to my friends Jason Mellen, Denny Bubrig, and Kelly Jo Larsen, at Bowling Green State University in Ohio for hosting me for on-site training a couple of weeks ago! It is always a pleasure to visit their campus (especially when it isn’t negative seven degrees outside!).  Not only was I able to speak to nearly 200 student leaders about how they can use OrgSync to manage their student organizations, I also met the entire staff from the Office of Campus Activities and, with the help of Denny, demonstrated how OrgSync can streamline office processes and eliminate paper forms.

In addition to all of that training, I was thrilled to have the opportunity to visit with Michael Dunk, a recent graduate of the M.A. in College Student Personnel  program at BGSU, who will be joining OrgSync this week!  I am pleased to welcome him to the OrgSync team and to Texas!

After the quick trip it was off to Las Vegas and Utah for yet more OrgSync training fun….tune in tomorrow for more on that!

Eric Fortenberry and I (Nicole Andreas) recently returned from a campus visit at the University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa!  We were warmly welcomed by Dr. Stacy Jones and her team in the Student Involvement and Leadership office.

The Division of Student Affairs at the University of Alabama is actively pursuing opportunities to maximize each UA student’s learning experience.  “After searching for a solution to manage students’ co-curricular involvement on the student side, campus side and staff side for about three years, we brought OrgSync to our campus as the “Source” to manage our student involvement.  After conducting focus groups composed of faculty and students, we quickly learned OrgSync was the only choice that fully met our management needs and excited students,” said Dr. Stacy Jones.

UA is creating an entire program and team dedicated to providing their students with the services and tools they need to manage their student organizations and involvement needs.  They are branding the program as the “Source”, as in: the source to go to for all student involvement and student organization management.

To kick off the launch of the Source powered by OrgSync, Stacy Jones and Kristen DuBose planned an exciting Launch Party on the Plaza with games, prizes, food and fun to intrigue students about the new Source program.  Everyone signed up on OrgSync through their “My Bama” accounts(a single-sign-on solution that UA chose to implement to simplify user registration through their current campus sign-on information), and the Launch Party was a brilliant success.

Our visit also included meetings with several campus departments including Bama faculty, advisors and administrators.  Each department was excited about bringing OrgSync to campus for different reasons.  Vice-President of Student Affairs, Dr. Mark Nelson, immediately saw value in getting every campus department at UA on board.  He even asked, “Does OrgSync print money too?  What can’t this [OrgSync] platform do!?”

In between scheduled meetings, Eric and I were shown around Alabama’s extraordinary campus by Daniel Ware, a student leader from UA’s Residence Hall Association.  It was fascinating to learn the history behind the Tuscaloosa campus, and it was great to meet so many friendly students during our tour.  While traveling through campus, Zeta Beta Theta and Phi Mu were campaigning on the Quad to gain signatures on a giant blow-up ball.  For each signature, a donation would be made to the Children’s Miracle Network.  Of course, Eric and I had to sign the ball.  We are all about giving back to those in need.

Daniel was a great tour guide!  He brought us to see the football stadium and to see the famous “Walk of Champions.”  The Walk of Champions honors Bama football coaches who have lead the school to victory, and it displays the SEC titles and awards the football team has been recognized for.

After our tour, we met in the Student Recreational Center on campus to get all of the club sports team signed up.  We had a great turnout and we met with many different teams who were excited to start using OrgSync in the Fall.  The women’s soccer team was especially excited to be able to manage different user groups and target their specific information to manage and engage their team more efficiently.  Primarily, the players were particularly excited to learn that they could juggle their hectic sports schedules AND their involvement with other campus activities from just one place.

Before we left, Eric and I were asked to share our story with two entrepreneurial classes in the business school.  We really enjoyed talking to the students, and we felt inspired as these future entrepreneurs sat in the same seat I was in not too long ago.  I think a lot of them were inspired too, just to know it really was the same seat, and many of them told us about their dreams of starting their own company some day.  Several students even came up to us after the class to learn how they could get involved, and help spread the word about OrgSync.

Overall, our visit was extremely successful, and I can’t wait to go back to the University of Alabama.  Roll Tide!

During the month of February, OrgSync started working with many new campuses from coast to coast.  We are extremely excited to welcome the University of Alabama – Birmingham, Arizona State University, Florida International University, Pace University @ Pleasantville-Briarcliff, University of the Incarnate Word, Adelphi University, Denison University, California State University @ Dominguez Hills, The City College of New York, Saint John’s University, and the University of Colorado @ Denver.  Together these schools account for approximately 150,000 students in over 1,900 organizations.

At Arizona State University, OrgSync will become the primary management tool for over 700 student organizations. “As one of the largest universities in the country, we have an extensive network of clubs and organizations that will benefit greatly from the organizational tools OrgSync offers” states ASU Assistant Director for Student Development, Jennifer Stultz; “OrgSync will not only help our individual clubs and organizations grow, but will also help them better integrate with one another and into the larger ASU community.”

To emphasize the importance of getting members involved on campus, OrgSync offers an unlimited number of online training webinars to students and faculty members.  OrgSync also includes an onsite training session with every initial purchase of the OrgSync platform.  The onsite trainings are very effective at helping organizations transition to a newer, more efficient method of communication. So far this spring, we’ve conducted onsite trainings with hundreds of leaders from The University of Alabama, St. John’s University, Bowling Green University, and Sacramento State University in conjunction with their respective spring leadership conferences.

As members of the OrgSync community, users from these schools will have the opportunity to provide feedback about the platform and drive future developments.  We look forward to working closely with each of these schools to provide them with a cost-saving, state-of-the-art management platform they can be proud of.

This weekend I had the pleasure of visiting our neighbor to the northwest, Lubbock, TX and one of our largest campuses, Texas Tech University. Tech, a client since May of 2008 boasts nearly 400 student organizations and has been a joy to work with over the past year. Mike Gunn, Assistant Director of Student Organizations, oversees all of the student organizations on campus and did a wonderful job of organizing their annual “Student Organization Academy”. The program held on Saturday, April 4th, offered 12 sessions covering various topics including leadership development, risk management, practical solutions to student organization issues, school spirit, transferring experiences as student leaders into the “real world”, community service, re-energizing your organization, and, of course, ORGSYNC!!

I was pleased to share OrgSync with a captive audience of over 200 student leaders. Students and Staff Advisors were excited to learn about how OrgSync will help them accomplish their missions and goals as organizations, and as always, I was asked many questions that will likely guide future development of our software.

After realizing that our founders and many of OrgSync’s staff are alumni of the University of Texas (which Texas Tech football stole a win from last season), the students there could not resist taking the picture above. Thanks Tech Students and Staff for being such great hosts and for your interest in serving the Tech community through your involvement in student organizations there!! I will look forward to visiting Lubbock again soon.

Last week, Eric and I (Jami Darden) traveled to the great state of New York to visit one of our newest clients, St. John’s University in Jamaica, Queens. St. John’s boasts an undergraduate population of nearly 15,000 students from 42 states, Puerto Rico, District of Columbia, U.S. Virgin Islands and 91 foreign countries. Among its notable alumni are leaders in virtually every industry, including business, medicine, politics, education, professional athletics, journalism, and entertainment. Needless to say, we are delighted to welcome this distinguished institution to the OrgSync family!

Many thanks go out to everyone on campus who not only worked tirelessly over the last several months to make OrgSync a reality for St. John’s student organizations, but also for their efforts arranging the on-site training sessions. We want to especially thank Dana Lezama, president of Student Government, Inc., who spear-headed this effort and was an exceptional host! Also, Frank Jerome, Business Analyst for the Office of Student Affairs, who is working with OrgSync support to create a single sign on solution which will make it convenient for St. John’s students to access OrgSync and their student organizations via “St. John’s Central”.

During our two-day visit, Eric and I conducted 12, 90 minute training sessions where we were able to meet with approximately 140 student leaders. We were also thrilled to share the news of our new strategic partnership with PayPal and are looking forward to providing a comprehensive budgeting and e-commerce solution to all of our clients. Eric was even able to meet with Barbara Duffy who manages all of the budget requests and fund allocations for student organizations at St. John’s, and she has provided us with lots of insight that will help guide the development of our new, more robust treasury module.

We were also very pleased to learn that all student organizations at St. John’s are required to complete a certain number of community service hours in order to be recognized on campus and receive funding from the university. It was quite rewarding to see students’ reactions as we showed them how OrgSync can be used to track their involvement in service events and programs. Their reporting process will now be streamlined and simplified! I definitely saw a sparkle in their eye as they realized that they finally have a way to quantify how their organizations are contributing to the culture of their campus and the surrounding community. We at OrgSync, of course, share their commitment to community service and service learning and will continue to work with our clients to showcase these types of efforts. Stay tuned to future blog posts and check back on our website to learn more about the “GIVE Act” recently passed by the U.S. House of Representatives.

Coming from a higher education background, I truly enjoyed interacting with all of the students and staff members at St. John’s. Their energy and commitment to a vibrant campus life is very refreshing and has reminded me of why I got into the business of working with student leaders. I can’t wait for our next on-site training. After a snowy Friday morning in New York, however, I was pleased to return to sunny skies and mid-eighty temperatures in Texas!

This past week Cayce and I (Eric Fortenberry) traveled to the Sacramento (‘Sac’) State campus to meet with campus administrators and train student leaders. We met with various departments including Student Affairs, Career Services, Event Services and Student Government. During our first meeting we were honored to present OrgSync to Edward Jones, Associate Vice President for Student Affairs, Campus Life. Edward expressed interest in providing OrgSync to all the student affairs departments to improve their communication and cross department scheduling. We were very exciting when Edward realized “OrgSync’s only limitation is our imagination.”

During our meeting with Sac State’s accounting department we discussed their student organization treasury needs. An online treasury solution is much needed and will be implemented slowly to assure that current treasury processes can be re-worked for efficiency. Another highlight was meeting with the Career Services department. They gave us some great feedback and suggestions on how we can continue to improve our resume builder and Co-curricular transcript manager. Lastly, we had Rebecca Dietzler and Rich Clakeley from Events Services walk us through their entire room reservation process. It’s always so exciting for us to have the opportunity to sit around a table and collaborate with campus leaders to brainstorm how our innovative software can benefit their campus in more ways then we ever intended.

The OrgSync leadership training for student leaders was held all day Saturday. We kicked off the day with a 90 minute in-depth walkthrough of all the “Nuts & Bolts” of OrgSync. Thanks to the Buzz Café, there was plenty of coffee and breakfast foods to keep everyone attentive. After the walkthrough we got the opportunity to visit with many excited student leaders. They wanted to know why OrgSync hadn’t been implemented on every campus years ago! After more food from the Buzz Café, the student leaders broke out into groups based on their positions. I co-hosted the planning and time management session with Leanna Neves-Bogetti, Student Activities Program Advisor, and enjoyed showing students how they could leverage our Calendar and ToDos modules to better plan and manage their time. At the same time Cayce was presenting in the philanthropy and community service session where he demonstrated how students could track their involvement and activity hours using our resume builder and co-curricular transcripts.

At the end of the day the Student Activities Office was excited to use their new Plinko board to raffle off prizes to the 75+ students who attended. They gave away everything from an iPod Nano to Peak Adventure trips and team paintballing. It was a great end to an already amazing day!

Overall, our trip to Sacramento State was very productive and gave us the opportunity to gather feedback from both students and campus leaders. We were also glad to build closer relationships with Tom, Karlos, Joanne, Leanna and Courtney in the Student Activities Office. They have been with us for over a year now and we are thankful for all of their efforts to spread OrgSync across the Sac State campus, as well as for their helpful feedback and feature suggestions that will improve the OrgSync platform for all. I can’t wait to book our next trip to Sac State!

Our final stop along the tour was Ohio Wesleyan University in Delaware, OH. As we drove from Toledo, OH to Delaware, OH it looked like we were driving through a Normal Rockwell Christmas Card. We also drove through Ben Roethlisberger’s hometown of Findlay, which may have been fitting for the upcoming Super Bowl. OWU was a great way to end the trip. When we arrived at the hotel they had a welcome package waiting for us. What a nice surprise!

OWU has less than 2,000 students but can boast of producing Nobel Prize winners, former Vice-Presidents, social justice activists, and Hollywood notables. OWU has a diverse population with students from all over the world, with a beautiful campus that happened to be under a blanket of snow when we arrived.

The Student Activities Office did a great job promoting their student leadership summit, which we were proud to be a part of. When we arrived in the Union we saw posters and flyers promoting OrgSync. Before we arrived students knew the name OrgSync even if they were not fully aware of what our solution offers.

During the Leadership Summit we were able to present and train all of the student organization presidents and advisors. OWU hosted the first Leadership Summit we have been invited to, and we were excited for the opportunity. We were also able to meet the new president of OWU, Dr. Rock Jones, and the keynote Speaker Dr. Ron Binder from the University of South Carolina. Dr. Jones (who likes the students to call him ‘Rock’) and Dr. Binder did a great job of inspiring and motivating the full house of excited student leaders. The students provided a great audience to work with; understanding the importance, as student leaders to leverage programs and technology, such as OrgSync, to help improve the management and communication for their organizations.

I look forward to building a long lasting relationship with OWU and watching the campus embrace OrgSync’s full capabilities!

Tuesday evening we made it to Toledo for our training at Owens Community College. However, we were deeply disappointed that our first day of training was canceled due to the steady snowfall and that our two-day training program was cut down to one.

Although we got several inches of snow, the cold did not discourage students and administrators from coming out to our training sessions. Students and organization advisors were excited to learn more about OrgSync and how it would be able to help solve their organization frustrations. The Owens staff was elated to learn how OrgSync will streamline their typically tedious tasks and create a paperless office within!
Students were astonished at OrgSync’s robust platform; allowing them to register organizations, submit event and travel requests, reserve meeting rooms, and download end of the year reports. And these are only a few of OrgSync’s capabilities!

During my experiences in higher education, I was always frustrated with the paperwork and bureaucracy that kept me from working directly with students. That is why I love OrgSync so much. Campus administrators can save time and money, which will allow them to work more closely with students! After all I did not get my masters degree in bureaucratic paper pushing, nor did any other professional in higher education (you all know what I am talking about).

Owens has a great student activities staff, and I look forward to seeing their campus evolve from all the opportunities OrgSync is bringing them. Although we are sad to leave Owens campus, it is time to move on to yet another campus. Onward to Ohio Wesleyan University. Stay tuned for part three of Le Tour de Ohio!

If you have read this blog for any amount of time you already realize how much OrgSync loves and appreciate our clients. We also love the opportunity to travel to new campuses, meet our clients face to face, conduct on-site trainings, and discuss the best way to launch an individual campus to meet their needs. Since I worked on college campuses for 10 years, I always feel at home regardless of the location. Eric and I (Jeff) just wrapped up the first leg of our Tour de Ohio with a trip to Bowling Green State University. We spent 2 days meeting with the Student Affairs staff, student leaders, and IT staff.

We spent most of our time learning about their student organization processes so we could best construct an implementation plan to meet their needs and make their life a little easier. I was extremely impressed with the support they give their student leaders. BGSU has an extensive student organization funding process, and a dedicated staff that counsels and advises organizations on fiscal responsibility. It was great to sit down with their staff and brainstorm how OrgSync could help simplify their process and free up time for the Student Affairs Office to work on increasing student engagement.

One of the highlights of the trip was when we were showing OrgSync to a group of students, and one of them blurted out, “Where has this website been?” As if she has spent a life-time manually filling out paperwork and tracking down advisors for signatures. The students were all very excited to explore OrgSync and are looking forward to all the capabilities OrgSync brings to BGSU. We look forward to working with Bowling Green State University and building a long lasting relationship with them.

Next Stop Owens Community College- Toledo, OH

Recently, OrgSync has had the opportunity to conduct on-site trainings at North Carolina State University and Owens Community College in Toledo, OH. We always enjoy on-site visits because we get to finally meet clients face-to-face after hours of phone conversations.

There are 2 key things I learned during these on-site trainings that I would like to share with our OrgSync community:

1. On-site training is key to adoption. Many students were content with using their facebook groups or listserves, and the really ambitious students tried to build a mini version of OrgSync on their website. After every session, students came up to us excited about using OrgSync and shared how a specific module was going to make their life easier. If the schools just told the students to use OrgSync without any support or training, the adoption would be much slower, and they would not have a clear understanding of how OrgSync can benefit them. Within a week of each training, user accounts have tripled on the respective campuses and continue to grow.

2. The students are going to follow the administrators’ lead. NC State does a great of using the umbrella portal. They have created a form for club registration, and have added campus wide polls and discussions on the forum to solicit student feedback. They require all presidents to create a profile and join a presidentʼs portal to improve communication by giving them a one-stop-shop for updates from the Student Life office.

I am looking forward to monitoring the user growths of these campuses, and continuing working with all of our clients to ensure strong adoption rates and excellent customer service. I look forward to returning to Owens in the spring for a follow-up training. We love our schools and the opportunities to visit and meet the students and administrators who are using OrgSync.