Everett Ohland uses One Bellarmine, Bellarmine’s new portal. Photo Credit: Corbin McGuire
BY QUIN WELCH, EDITOR-IN-CHIEF
Bellarmine University has finally made its switch from its old portal, MyBellarmine, to its new portal, One Bellarmine.
The portal switch is part of Bellarmine’s “Embrace Our Replace” project, which Eric Satterly, vice provost for information technology, describes as “the replacement of almost every critical information system at Bellarmine.”
The project has focused on replacing Bellarmine’s old Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) system, Jenzabar’s CX, with Ellucian Colleague. One Bellarmine is the brand Satterly and his team gave to the portal.
A group of several people, called the “Portal Team,” along with Ellucian consultants, developed the portal. Satterly and the portal team decided it was time for a new portal as opposed to re-designing MyBellarmine.
“The My Bellarmine portal is tied to the old system and once we moved to the new system we needed to build a new portal,” Satterly said.
Satterly’s goal for One Bellarmine is simple: to make life easy electronically for the people at Bellarmine.
“I hope it (One Bellarmine) allows everyone in our community to easily find the information they need,” Satterly said. “My vision for One Bellarmine is that it is the one place you can go to find all of Bellarmine’s online resources. It’s not there yet, but it’s the best step we’ve ever taken in this regard.”
Some members of the campus community agree with Satterly’s assessment of One Bellarmine as an unfinished product with loads of potential. Denise Brown-Cornelius, Assistant Vice President for Business Affairs, said she has high hopes for the portal but noted that there is still work to be done.
“It’s going to be revolutionary. I don’t think it’s quite revolutionary yet just because of this massive ERP implementation we’ve taken on,” Brown-Cornelius said. “But, it’s going to be great and it’s going to be a great experience for all involved. We just have to get there.”
Brown-Cornelius also said One Bellarmine is not an improvement from My Bellarmine.
“I don’t think it’s there yet. I’m just going to be honest. But it’s going to be,” Brown-Cornelius said. “Any type of growth is painful. I don’t think we’re there yet from an overall perspective but I’ve seen what it can do and I know it has the capabilities. It’s just prioritizing and getting it all out there.”
Satterly shares Brown-Cornelius’s optimism for the future of the portal, but disagrees with the belief that the portal is not an upgrade from My Bellarmine. He said he believes the portal allows for inevitable technological advances, something he values greatly.
“So many things are better with our new portal. Fundamentally, the new portal is built on a modern technology platform, Sharepoint. This platform not only allows us to provide access to information in the Ellucian Colleague system, but it also gives us a framework to integrate other information systems in the future,” Satterly said.
Overall, Satterly said he is pleased with One Bellarmine because of what it provides the campus community in one place.
“We have the ability to utilize lots of other office tools and functionality, all under one roof. We have just begun to scratch the surface with what we can deliver through One Bellarmine, so expect frequent feature enhancements.”