Before we arrange a counselling appointment for students we ask them to complete two forms.
We would like to enable students to access these forms from the Student Counselling Service (SCS) website. They would complete the forms either by:
Downloading a word version of our forms and emailing the completed forms to our generic email account. This way they are returned in a format suitable forprocessing by the administrators
Or
Completing the forms online in a secure area (e.g. logging in with their EASE password) then submit them to our generic email account. We work with an online filing system and we would need these forms to be returned to us in a specific format (currently not available to us in Polopoly environment)
Why is it needed/What are the benefits?:
We ask all students who approach SCS to complete a compulsory Registration Form and an optional questionnaire. Since moving to the Main Library Building our numbers have increased by 89% and we are expecting this to be more by the end of the academic year. Currently students request and appointment, forms are attached to an email, students complete the forms, save them and return them attached to an email. The consequence of this is a significant increase in the administrative workload and the possibility of error due to the volume of documents.
Online forms will:
reduce the workload for the administrators allowing them to focus on other tasks
provide a safe space for students to complete the forms
reduce email traffic and the margin for error
enable students to access the forms as soon as they make the decision to request an appointment rather than waiting for a response to their email request
enable us to offer a speedy and efficient response that fits with the student’s needs(see Aim 1. in the Directional Statement)