Keynote Per Zettervall: Admissions in Sweden – A story of legislation, systems and cooperation -...

Admissions in Sweden

2014-06-03Per Zettervall

System modernization2

HE and HEI:s in SwedenHow many are there? How big are they? Where are they? Etc…

16/05/2013

Some swedish facts• 9,5 million people

• 450 000 km2

• 21 inhabitants/km2

• From north to south:1 572 km

• Towns:̶.Stockholm 1,4 million̶.Gothenburg 550 000̶.Malmö 280 000

HEI:s in Sweden• 55 institutions in total

• Oldest: Uppsala university (1477)

• Youngest: Linnaeus university (2010)

• Largest: Stockholm university 36 700 students

• Smallest: Gammelkroppa forest school, 25 students

• Distance: Luleå-Malmö 1 470 km

• All basic and second level education financed by the government for swedish and EEA students

• Each HEI gets paid for the amount of full time students, enrollment and achievements

• Expensive educations get more money per student

• However, there is a maximum amount for each institution that the government will pay for

• Hence, all institutions try to hit that exact number which effects the number of courses available to students

Financing of HEI:s

Fields of cooperation UHR-HEI:s• Virtual organizations: Efficient way of using admission experts

• Advisory groups: What funtionality to build (and what not to build)

• Production coordination: Deadlines, planning…

• Specification of requirements: Detailed description of functionality

• Testing: Does the new functionality work well för the HEI?

• Development: Done by ITS at University of Umeå

• Financing using the reversed Robin Hood-method

• MOOC:s

• Admission of international students (outside EEA)

• Expansion of vocational training

• Cooperations, thoughts of merging with others

• Fewer applicants expected up to 2020 due to demographic reasons

Hot topics for the universities today

About UHROur tasks, our work, some figures

Continual development, communication and provision of a broad range of advanced services in the form of:

• Studies and analyses

• Objective and relevant information about higher education

• Admission services

• Expertise and service on admission procedures

• Recognition of qualifications from abroad

• Opportunities for international collaboration

• Application management

The Swedish Council for Higher Education’s areas of responsibility

• 225 employees

• 2013 – 823,735 applications/458,318 admissions

• Antagning.se / Universityadmissions.se

• 6 million unique hits (2013)

• studera.nu

• 3 million unique hits (2013)

• SweSAT 2012 – 133,000 registered

• 60 international programmes

About us

System modernization15

AAn introduction to the swedish admission system and to the hottest topics of today

16/05/2013

• ”Everyone knows that an applicant with a score of 17,25 is much better than an applicant with a score of 17,24”

• ”The SAT test is bad at predicting how successful the student will be”

• ”Fairness is a top priority”

• ”And so are costs”

• ”Rules should be detailed, there is no room for uncertainty”

• ”Things such as motivation, suitability and other things that can not be desribed in figures or numbers can not be relied on”

• ”Code of conduct is important"

True (or not) about swedish admissions

• UHR has agreements with 37 universities and university colleges

• The agreements are the framework for cooperation and sharing of responsibilities between UHR and the university.

• UHR handles seven national admissions rounds

Relations between UHR and HEI

One country – Two systems

The history of Student Information Systems• First version of Ladok: 1975

• Several different systems until 1993 when all converted to Ladok

• New version ”Ladok Nouveau” in 1999 due to Y2K

• And now, the system is rebuilt from scratch, Ladok3

The history of Admission Systems• First version in 1975

• Updates/new versions in 1991 and 1997

• Two systems, one for single subject courses and one for study programmes

• Since 2006, NyA handles it all

The NyA System

• National Admissions System

• Developed by the Swedish universities and colleges together with the UHR

• Used by all of the largest universities and university colleges in Sweden

• Used for admission to all higher education̶.Programs, single subject courses on all levels (except for doctoral

studies)

The NyA System – User Interfaces

Java client Applications Registering qualifications Administering system rules Admission rounds Scheduling automated processess

Web application(Teacher web) Lists and statistics View applications and documents

Web application(Applicant web) Course search and application Status of processing View credentials

NyA

Scanning

LADOK

BEDA

ApplicationAssessment

Applicant

Notification of results

From application to admission 3-4 months

The admission process

HP

The Admission Process in NyA

The Admission Process in NyA

Course transfer

Course search and application

PreparationAutomated application processing

Assessment of

qualifications

Selection and notification

Result transfer

Transferring Courses to the System

• Courses from local course databases to NyA• Setting up an admission round

• Admission round is used to administer courses and programs with the same application period

• Setting up requirement and ranking models

The Application Process in NyA

Course search and application

Preparation of applications

Automated application processing

Assessment of

qualifications

Selection and notification

Result transfer

Course transfer

Course Search and Application

• Course search on the web (www.antagning.se) • Online application• 99,9 % of the applications submitted electronically on

Antagning.se/Universityadmissions.se

The Application Process in NyA

Course transfer

PreparationAutomated application processing

Assessment of

qualifications

Selection and notification

Result transferCourse search

and application

Preparation

• Qualifications transferred to NyA electronically• Documents are scanned and digitalised• Registering qualifications into the system• Admission fees and exemptions

The Application Process in NyA

Course transfer

Course search and application

Automated application processing

Assessment of

qualifications

Selection and notification

Result transfer

Preparation

Automated Application Processing

• Automated assessment of general eligibility• Qualifications matched with entry requirements (requirement

models)• Automated ranking according to ranking models

The Application Process in NyA

Course transfer

Course search and application

PreparationAssessment

of qualifications

Selection and notification

Result transferAutomated

application processing

Assessment of Qualifications

• Manual assessment of qualifications• Exemptions from formal requirements• Ranking of applicants• Local admissions officers and professors

The Application Process in NyA

Course transfer

Course search and application

PreparationAutomated application processing

Selection and notification

Result transfer

Assessment of qualifications

Admissions Selection and Notification

• Applicants are admitted in order of preference• Two selection rounds• The applicants are required to reply after the first round

The Application Process in NyA

Course transfer

Course search and application

PreparationAutomated application processing

Assessment of

qualifications

Result transfer

Selection and notification

Transferring the Admissions Result

• Admissions results are sent to the universities• The results are loaded into the study documentation system (Ladok)

The Application Process in NyA

Course transfer

Course search and application

PreparationAutomated application processing

Assessment of

qualifications

Selection and notification

Result transfer

Distributed Handling of Applications

• A central service agency (UHR)̶.Scanning/digitalising documents̶.Registering digital documents̶.Assessing eligibility ̶.Contact Centre for applicants̶.System operation

• The universities ̶.Assessment of course specific requirements̶.Courses and programmes at advanced level̶.Exemptions from formal requirements

• All applicants send their documentation to one place Cost efficient for the universities Easy process for applicants to understand and complete Every university can view applicant documentation at anytime

• Possible to request originals and other types of documentation when necessary Suspicion of fraud Documents are illegible DVD:s, books etc

Scanning

• Contact Center answers questions of a general character regarding the application process

• UHR and HEI provides a second line for telephone and mail for applicants with questions of a more complex and personal character

• Open 9 am to 4 pm. Until midnight on critical dates

• Always first to report if there are problems with the web site

Contact center

• Use all resources in a cost efficient way so that all participating universities can better manage their time and receive a qualified assessment of the applicants qualifications.

• One application – one admissions officer

• Agreements with 23 universities

• Sometimes problematic to get the right resources and the right amount of them

Virtual organizations

Admissions Decisions

• Each university makes its own decisions regarding admissions, including exemptions.

• The applicant submits an appeal of any admission decision to the decision-making university.

• Legal framework

1. University law decided by the Parliament/Riksdagen

2. Higher Education Ordinance decided by the Government

3. Directives decided by the Swedish Council for Higher Education on behalf of the Higher Education Ordinance

4. Local regulations decided by each university/university college

5. Guidelines, manuals, handbooks

Data exchange

School Qualifications database

Scholastic Aptitude Test

Tax Agency

Ladok

Admission System

Ladok

Postal Service

Study Support

Statistics Sweden

• Yearly, about 1,8 million € (2.2 million $) spent on further development, new functionality

• About 4 million € (5.1 million $) spent on maintaining the system

• About 1,6 million € (2.1 million $) spent on Service Operations

• …a lot of money but costs are shared between HEI…

• …complex regulations = a complex and expensive system…

Costs for NyA…

• A brand new national student records system, Ladok3, is being developed right now and discussions are ongoing what functionality should be in which system.

• The need for (mostly foreign) applicants to attach scanned documents to their application.

• Improvements of the application web site regarding accessibility

• New system/database for High School certificates

• Automated tests, improved logging

• System stability issues

• New regulations, more complexity added

What´s on the table right now?

The award winning application web site…It´s only a swedish award, and only in the category ”educational web sites” but nevertheless…..

• www.antagning.se

Demo time…

The scary date…

• Ca 50 000 applications the last hours

• The applicants browse a lot

• Different issues at CGI

• The universities are pretty ok with an extension of the deadline

• And are somewhat reluctant to finance further investments

• However it is not good for UHR to be known for ”the system that breaks down annually”

What is the problem?

Application management and development

SCRUM

Sprints - Iterations

Retrospect affects planning of future sprints through changes in prioritizations, requirements and new User Stories

Teammember Product Owner

Stake holders, Others

Sprint

Backlog

User Stories handled in the sprint/iteration

Sprintplanning, day 1

Sprint Demo

Retrospect

Product Backlog

3 weeks

Från koncept till Product Backlog

User Stories –focus on use and usability in the development project

The System Object NyA

• NyA, the system̶. The expert client̶. Antagning.se/Universityadmissions.se ̶. Teachers web (webbgränssnitt för sällananvändare av NyA)̶. Interface to external systems̶. NyA-Open (copy of the database)̶. Beda (national certificate database)

• The process that the system supports

• Documentation regarding process and system

The yearly plan

Tracks and product owners in NyA

Product Owners

Reference group

Reference Group

Reference group

Backlog Backlog

Backlog

• Development is split into tracks/system parts

• Every track has its own Product Owner who is responsible for the backlog

• Every track has a reference group with stake holders from HEI

• The product owners and the main product owner meet every other week in the Product Owners Forum

Application Management

The strategy (3 years)

Backlog (always)

The yearly plan (1 year)

• Long term goals

• Prioritized areas of improvement

• Principles for prioritizing

• Definition of the tracks

• Special focus areas

• Specific development projects

Product Owners Forum

Application council • List of things to do

• Continous prioritization

• Development, requirements and testing within the team

Reference group

Application Management

Group

www.uhr.se

Thank you!Per Zettervall

per.zettervall@uhr.se

www.uhr.se