Pathify

How is Pathify different from Atlas?

Pathify is an engagement hub. Atlas had become merely a list of links leading users to other web applications. Pathify provides a personalized, centralized dashboard to guide the student journey. Users will only see information relevant to them. The right information, to the right person at the right time.

What is an "Engagement Hub?

The traditional student portal/link farm provides the same value as a complex treasure map where X marks the spot. Students consistently say they have no idea what content and resources their school invests in. Pathify’s Engagement Hub eliminates the dense digital jungle, enabling schools to proactively push the right content to the right people and drive student success.

Is Valencia replacing Atlas with a mobile app?

The portal will not be completely replaced by a mobile application. There is a robust mobile app experience that comes with Pathify as our new tool. You will be able to access everything in the Pathify Mobile app that you could if you viewed it in a web browser. Accessing the website will be optimized for mobile phone, tablet and desktop viewing.

What is the mobile app used for?

All features and functionality of the Pathify Engagement Hub perform via web or native mobile app (iOS and Android) so all students access it anywhere.

Will we still have to use Multi-factor Authentication?

Yes. Multifactor Authentication (MFA) is here to stay. MFA adds an extra layer of protection to guard your information. Information security is everyone's responsibility. MFA helps guard your most critical information.

Will Lifemap still be in Pathify?

Yes. Subject matter experts will be reviewing what is currently in Atlas & determine the best way to show that information in Pathify.

Why are we replacing Atlas?

The tool that powers Atlas, Ellucian's Luminis is at the end of its life. A year long review of possible replacement tools along with an RFI process has led Valencia to choose Pathify as our replacement

Will I lose access to the things I use?

You will continue to have access to all systems you had before. Atlas will look different, but will be much more user friendly.

Is there a problem with Atlas?

There is no problem with the stability of our current Atlas. We have selected Pathify as our replacement to provide a better experience for students, faculty & staff.

Will all areas have the chance to give input on content?

Part of the implementation involves each area (sub-group) reviewing their content currently in Atlas & on the public website to determine what should be moved over. Atlas content will be owned by content editors across the college, much like the public website. As part of this implementation & planning, we will be developing a robust support model for both Students & Employees. We haven’t formed any of the content owner/groups yet. More info will be coming soon.

Will students have to sign in multiple times to get to all the different systems?

No, all Single Sign-on functionality will be available in Pathify.

Will I have to be on VPN to connect to Pathify?

No. VPN is not required to access any part of Pathify. Some links to external systems may require VPN.

How will students see … in Canvas?

Canvas will remain the same. Students & Faculty will still be able to Single Sign-on to Canvas from the engagement hub.

How can I create help guides for students if we can't use screen shots?

With the new search functionality, it will be easier to tell students to search for a keyword that will bring back the info. This will take some getting used to, but in the long run the design features in Pathify will help students navigate more easily & be less dependent on Help Desk or Faculty support to find where something is in the engagement hub.

Can we pull in External Calendars?

Not at the moment, but it is an interesting idea we will look into.

How do Canvas Assignments get shown?

They show in the Assignments tab in the Canvas widget. They do not get folded into the calendar widget

Will there be a widget for Degree Works?

Yes

Can we choose to see only a specific campus on the event calendar?

Yes, the event calendars can be filtered in much the same way as they are currently.

Are we renaming Atlas? When?

More information will be available about this soon.

How can I see what another user sees if everything is so personalized?

Pathify has much more modern personalization for the end users. Valencia can choose to make some widgets non-removable (like O365/email & Canvas), but others we will leave to students to add as needed. A much more robust search functionality exists in Pathify – the search will cover notifications, pages, widgets, tasklists, and more. Search results also show the type. It makes it much easier for you to find the info you are looking for. Even if you don’t have a widget on your home screen, you can see the widget in search results.

Will the go-live interfere with registration?

We are paying close attention to the timing so as not to interfere with registraion, start of term, end of term finals or grades.

What's the timeline?

We will be rolling this out first with a soft-launch & then with a wide cutover. The first phase of Pathify implementation is focused on Students. More information will be added to the Pathify project site when we have it.

Will employees be using Pathify for timecards, pay, benefits, etc like we do Atlas or will those be moving to another system?

Functions like timecards, paystubs & contact info will stay in SSB where they are now. These functions do not live in Atlas, just the links to them. The links will be available in Pathify. Benefits is a 3rd party website. All current SSOs will move to Pathify in some form or another. Any system that you need to access will still be available through Pathify. Some will be links out to external websites via SSO, and some will be brought in as an iFrame into Pathify.

Is there a robust student support plan for implementation?

Part of the implementation involves each area (sub-group) reviewing their content currently in Atlas & on the public website to determine what should be moved over. Atlas content will be owned by content editors across the college, much like the public website. As part of this implementation & planning, we will be developing a robust support model for both Students & Employees. We haven’t formed any of the content owner/groups yet. More info about this will be coming soon.

What is the default view for Pathify?

There is no default view for Pathify. When an account is created & the user logs in for the first time, they will be presented with a standard set of widgets for their role(s). There will also be standard links show to users based on roles.

Will this be rolled out all at once?

We will be rolling this out first with a soft-launch & then with a wide cutover. The first phase of Pathify implementation is focused on Students. There will be employee content at launch, but much of it will just be the same links that are currently in Atlas.

With Atlas, we have specific and set directions for accessing specific information so creating our canned responses is easy because all students see the same thing. Will the personalization aspect of Pathify make it more difficult to help students?

Help desk can see what a student sees. The canned responses will be even easier with Pathify because you won’t need to rely on the position of content in Atlas (which also can change).

How does one support a student over the phone when I cannot see what they are seeing?

Pathify has an easy impersonation function. The Impersonation feature enables a User to impersonate another User within the portal. While Impersonating a User, you will have access to all of the content available to that User. Help desk employees can see exactly how a student has their layout. With the new search functionality, it will be easier to tell students to search for a keyword that will bring back the info. This will take some getting used to, but in the long run the design features in Pathify will help students navigate more easily & be less dependent on Help Desk or Faculty support to find where something is in the engagement hub.