University Advancement wins 2024 CASE Grand Gold Circle of Excellence Award

INSIDE TXST

Jayme Blaschke | July 3, 2024

The Division of University Advancement at Texas State University has been awarded a 2024 Grand Gold Circle of Excellence Award by the Council for Advancement and Support of Education (CASE).

University Advancement was honored for the submission “Partnering With Students to Get an A in Database Hygiene” in the category of Advancement Services/Advancement Services Initiatives (More Than 25 Staff).

“We are thrilled and immensely proud of our Advancement Services team for developing a submission that the judges recognized as a highly effective and efficient way to deliver work assignments to our student employees,” said Brooks Hull, vice president for University Advancement. “This achievement highlights the dedication and innovation of our team, and it reinforces the vital role our student employees play as an extension of our staff.”

The winning project was designed to assist with the ongoing challenge of maintaining data integrity in the customer relationship management (CRM) system. Multiple dashboards were created and assigned to student workers to manage. Assigning a specific dashboard to each student provided them with a clear overview of their responsibilities, while allowing consistent monitoring of their work. This also gave students a sense of ownership and accountability for their assignments. Each dashboard consisted of various audit queries built out and organized based on specific areas in the CRM, such as address, education and constituency information as well as alias, biographical and employment data. Each student was trained to make correct and consistent updates associated with each audit query; they saw how all the data flowed together, building their knowledge of the data structure. By implementing this process, TXST streamlined data management so full-time staff members weren’t dedicating as much time to routine data cleaning. This provided extra time for staff members to concentrate on work of higher value or requiring more expertise.

The CASE judges wrote, “The judges love that this submission was a highly effective and efficient way to deliver work assignments to student employees. It provided accountability and ownership on the assignments. As our student employees are an extension of our staff, we are grateful to have their assistance. The creativity and innovation of this solution was ranked exceptional, with great impact and results.”