Voting is Open for the 2019 Summit Awards!

Every day, colleges and universities across the globe are innovating and changing the student journey for the better. The Summit Awards, presented annually at the Salesforce.org Higher Ed Summit, gives an opportunity to recognize the incredible Trailblazers in the Salesforce.org higher education community. After reading so many remarkable stories about transformation and success, our finalists have been selected and voting for the 2019 Summit Awards is now LIVE!

Before you get ready to cast your ballot, take a minute to read each finalist’s success story.

You’ll be blown away by how far some colleges and universities have come in terms of creating efficiencies, ensuring student success, and innovating across campus with the help of Salesforce.org Education Cloud.

After you’ve picked your favorite finalist in each category, please vote today. Voting is the most important step! It’s your chance to take part in recognizing your peers (or your own university) for the hard work they’re doing to create change. Voting will close March 1st. In the meantime, feel free to participate in ongoing conversations about the Awards and much more in the Higher Ed Summit 2019 group in the Power of Us Hub.

Congratulations to the finalists! Here they are with an excerpt from their award submissions to give you some inspiration to vote.

Finalists in Overall Excellence in Student Success

Western Governors University
“WGU has moved mountains for students, as a community, to ensure that those who are impacted by natural disasters have custom personalized support pathways that provide them a light at the end of their tunnel.”
– Heather Saulnier, Director, Evaluation Experience and Support

Marist College, The Center for Social Media in the School of Communication and the Arts
“We are taking students who have been using social media for entertainment to the next stage. We’re turning native users into experts and preparing them for industry by training them in not only Social Studio, but how to use these tools to their best advantage.”
– Carolyn Ringer Lepre, Ph.D., Dean, School of Communication and the Arts

Cal State East Bay, Compass – Campus Wide CRM Team
“At likely the most diverse campus in the country, Cal State East Bay’s ‘Compass’ program is a campus-wide Customer Relationship Management (CRM) effort. It’s focused on delivering timely, relevant, and data driven information and, importantly, intervening actions to students when and as they need it.”
– Jake Hornsby, Chief Information Officer

Finalists in Overall Excellence in Operational Efficiency

University of New England, UNE Online
“The HEDA migration and SIS integration project also has impact in broader ways – providing a strong entry point for buy-in to the system from academic unit leadership as well as our research and data analysts, who now have more access to historical and current data in addition to robust dashboard and reporting tools.”
– Michelle Littlefield, Assistant Dean, Finance & Strategy, College of Graduate & Professional Studies

Santa Fe College, Admissions & International
“Santa Fe College is opening doors for international students, powered by some clever use of Salesforce functionality and a digital-first approach. That digital-first approach in student engagement has dramatically changed how the college helps international students navigate the enrollment process, and overcome barriers that used to seem insurmountable.”
– Quinten Eyman, Coordinator, Admissions Recruitment and Orientation

University of Miami, Division of Enrollment Management
“Internally, we were able to increase user adoption in Salesforce, provide a centralized system of record for recruitment, and effectively collaborate across multiple departments instantaneously. Externally, we were able to reduce the average amount of time between an off-campus interaction with a student and having that student’s information actionable in the CRM.”
– Joseph Yancey, Sr. Enrollment Analyst, CRM Innovation

Finalists in Overall Excellence in Innovation

*Please note: the winner of the Overall Excellence in Innovation Award is selected by a Salesforce.org leadership panel.

Rutgers University, Division of Continuing Studies
“Another area of innovation is our approach to project staffing. Our team is comprised of three to five graduate interns who are currently pursuing Master of Information Technology and Analytics degrees from the Rutgers University Business School. The students, who previously had no Salesforce experience, are trained with Trailhead and have collectively earned more than 150 badges.”
– Danielle Hernandez, MLIS, MBS Business Intelligence Architect

University of California, Santa Barbara, Bren School of Environmental Science & Management
“Our Career and Alumni Team at UCSB’s Bren School of Environmental Science & Management is using Community Cloud to power BrenConnect, a unique student-alumni portal that’s driving Innovation by enhancing professional connections and career success for our community in the digital age.”
– Kristi Berney, Associate Director, Career Development and Alumni Relations

International Technological University, Information Technology
“The university’s method takes advantage of Salesforce APIs to collect raw data from different higher education, government, and international accreditation bodies and compile them with complex data mining algorithms to fetch data and create custom reports. These reports then allow universities to track, monitor, and analyze their growth, benchmarked against other universities.”
– Kranthi Lammatha, Chief Technology Officer

What are you waiting for? Read the submission details and then vote to pick among the finalists and help select the winners by March 1.

VOTE FOR THE SUMMIT AWARDS