Paws Up
ctcLink is not simply a matter of adapting to new software, it’s about changing how we work. This change is taking a lot of kibble to make sure we are successful.
Through Paws Up, Delta Dog and the ctcLink team celebrate the extraordinary efforts of Highline employees with the Golden Paw Award.
March 17, 2021
Super Bowl Sunday Warriors: SMEs and ctcLink Project TeamThis week’s Golden Paw Award winners are the SMEs and ctcLink Project Team members who worked on Sunday, Feb. 7 (aka Super Bowl Sunday), to validate our data, attend virtual meetings and more prior to Go-Live on Monday, Feb. 8. The recognition is long overdue, but no less heartfelt. Names are listed alphabetically by first name. (If your name is missing from the list, accept our apologies and email Delta Dog.) Woof, woof to you all!
- Cathy Cartwright
- Chantal Carrancho
- Chase Magliocca
- Chau Trac
- David Nguyen
- David Severe
- Delta Dog
- Dianna Thiele
- Edith Dillard
- Feney Perez
- Gary McCune
- Gretchen Erhart
- Jennifer Scanlon
- Jill Hammitt
- John Mosby
- Kendra Ferrer
- Kharmyn Williams
- Koreen Jack
- Leslea Berg
- Lilly Oh
- Loyal Allen Jr.
- Mariya Matyash
- Megan Marchand
- Michael Pham
- Pat Daniels
- Quynh Mihara
- Rachna Karnik
- Rosemary Darrough
- Sarah Trimm
- Shaden Attili
- Sue Paulson
- Thi Nguyen
- Tim Wrye
- Victoria Solano
March 10, 2021
Human Resources StaffThanks to the dedicated, determined Human Resources staff, Highline employees continued to get paid after the college went live on ctcLink early in February. The first payroll run came quickly after Go-Live, leaving little time to learn the new system and work out glitches. For their long hours of work and perseverance, this week’s Golden Paw Award goes to the HR crew:
- Leslea Berg
- Ty Crosby
- Gretchen Erhart
- Koreen Jack
- Summer Korst
- Megan Marchand
- Mariya Matyash
- Sue Paulson
- Amber Trillo
Woof to you all for pulling off this monumental task!
Has one of your colleagues gone to extraordinary effort during Highline’s journey to ctcLink? Nominate them for a Golden Paw Award by emailing Delta Dog.
February 3, 2021
Kendra Ferrer, Victoria Solano and Chau TracThis week’s winners of the Golden Paw Award are Kendra Ferrer, Victoria Solano and Chau Trac. These three ctcLink stars were nominated by Jill Hammitt and Pat Daniels, who shared their appreciation in separate, yet related, nominations:
Jill wrote: “I would like to nominate Kendra and Victoria and say ‘thank you’ to others in our Finance office who have been supporting our Student Financials Team. There have been a lot of changes and long-into-the-evening testing sessions. This is on top of the work they have done trying to get accounts closed out in FMS and normal work for the start of the term. We are working very hard this week finalizing all of the validation and testing so that our student accounts can be accurate for Go-Live.”
Pat nominated Chau “for working into the wee hours of the morning — on the weekend — to get some information together for the State Board team so we could have a meeting to sort out some Student Financials configuration first thing Monday morning.”
Through their extraordinary efforts, Highline is making great strides in our collective journey to ctcLink. Woof to all of you!
January 27, 2021
Rosemary Darrough and Jill HammittThis week’s winners of the Golden Paw Award are Rosemary Darrough and Jill Hammitt, both of whom are ctcLink business systems analysts.
Raegan Copeland nominated this dynamic duo, confident she was speaking on behalf of all those closely involved in the ctcLink project:
“These two have put in countless hours on the ctcLink project. Throughout the project they’ve been incredibly patient while keeping us all moving forward, problem-solving and assisting in the actual production work. There is so much! We would be buried and lost without them.”
Thank you, Rosemary and Jill, for your work to help all of us at Highline on the journey to ctcLink. Woof to you!
December 30, 2020
Ta’Yanna Davis, Financial AidThis week’s Golden Paw Award goes to Ta’Yanna Davis, nominated by Ay Saechao and Pat Daniels. Here’s what they shared about Ta’Yanna’s award-winning activities:
“Ta’Yanna has been working hard to dig into several learning activities and engaging with the State Board Project Team to work through the complexities of processing Financial Aid in ctcLink. She has worked in partnership with David Nguyen (Financial Aid) in understanding what is needed for Dual Processing as well as pushing through most of the user acceptance testing (UAT) tasks set before them. Ta’Yanna has balanced serving students, adjusting and rising to the complex demands of remote financial aid operations, working with the Financial Aid staff to prepare them for the change, and persevering through any challenge that comes her way — always moving forward through obstacles and recognizing the accomplishments of others with a smile and a positive can-do attitude. Ta’Yanna is on her way to becoming a Financial Aid ctcLink Super SME!”
Super, indeed! Thank you, Ta’Yanna, for bringing your best to our collective journey to ctcLink. Woof to you!
December 23, 2020
David Nguyen, Financial AidFor this week’s award, we turn to Pat Daniels, ctcLink project manager:
“David Nguyen deserves the Golden Paw Award for pushing through a complex set of instructions and getting through Financial Aid Dual Processing Parallel Testing. Highline is the first college in our deployment group to complete this test all the way through!”
The State Board’s Ankur Rattan also had kudos for David’s efforts: “I was really impressed, that although you guys started a bit late, but the pace with which David picked up the testing of the Dual Processing processes was remarkable.”
Thank you, David, for your work to help all of us at Highline on the journey to ctcLink. Woof to you!
December 9, 2020
Wuhye Chun, Raegan Copeland, Duncan Kajoka, Feney Perez and Tara WoodsJill Hammitt, ctcLink business systems analyst, shared the important and valued work of this group of five:
“Duncan, Feney, Raegan, Tara and Wuyhe put in many hours last week building approximately 130 class lists. For comparison, most colleges during this time built only about 50 class lists. This work is part of building the new Degree Audit feature in ctcLink.”
Their work doesn’t end there. She adds, “This week they’ll start production work on new Transfer Credit rules. This group’s work is on top of their user acceptance testing for sprint 2. They have really done a great job learning and building these wonderful tools for Highline. It is a lot of work and they have a limited time period to get this work done.”
Through their extraordinary efforts, Highline is making great strides in our collective journey to ctcLink. Woof to Duncan, Feney, Raegan, Tara and Wuyhe!
December 2, 2020
Subject Matter Experts“Our subject matter experts (SMEs) have been completing user acceptance tests, validating data and attending in-person learning trainings. While working to learn the PeopleSoft system, our SMEs are also critically thinking about our business processes and examining how their daily tasks may change,” said Rosemary Darrough, ctcLink business systems analyst, in her nomination of all of Highline’s SMEs for the coveted Golden Paw Award.
“Throughout these many comprehensive, focus-intensive activities, our SMEs are still providing services to students and employees as part of their regular positions. Our SMEs across all pillars — Campus Solutions, Finance and Human Capital Management — have continued to be dedicated to this work and have met the challenge of implementing ctcLink. Thank you, all!”
These activities have required a huge amount of work and dedication by our SMEs. Thanks to them, Highline is making great strides in our collective journey to ctcLink. Woof to all of our SMEs!
November 4, 2020
Leslea Berg and Megan Marchand, Human ResourcesRosemary Darrough, who is a ctcLink business systems analyst at Highline, shared the amazing accomplishments of two hard-working employees:
“Megan Marchand is a new employee in the Human Resource office. She has jumped in with the ctcLink project and completed all required trainings. Megan will be supporting part-time faculty and has worked across campus divisions to coordinate work and build relationships. She has participated in many project meetings and provided input, all while learning her job and providing service to Highline employees. Way to go, Megan!
“Leslea Berg also works in Human Resource and has coordinated ctcLink activities within her department. She has worked with her colleagues to organize testing and validation, including tracking documents and running comparison reports. She has worked with her team to ensure they have a plan to get through the various ctcLink projects while providing employee services to the campus. Thank you, Leslea!”
Through their extraordinary efforts, Highline is making great strides in our collective journey to ctcLink. Woof to Leslea and Megan!
October 28, 2020
Course and Class Building Team: Kili Cambra, Justin Farris, Monditza Fournier, Crystal Kitterman and Vicky MontgomeryJill Hammitt, who is a ctcLink business systems analyst at Highline, shared the amazing accomplishments of Highline’s Course and Class building team:
“The State Board team did a full analysis of our work in the ctcLink production system to identify any issues that could impact our conversion. They found ONE error that can impact conversion and it is any easy clean up that Crystal has probably already fixed. The rest of the issues identified are minor and one caused by a bug that has been escalated to Oracle.
“In my previous experience with the prior deployment groups, most colleges have a significant amount of clean up at this point in the process, and this has been a huge area of struggle for some colleges. The State Board has also been tracking numbers for how many courses have been cleaned up in the catalog and the number of classes scheduled for winter and spring terms and Highline has consistently been the leader in this work.”
Through the extraordinary efforts of the Course and Class building team, Highline is making great strides in our collective journey to ctcLink. Woof to Kili, Justin, Monditza, Crystal and Vicky!
October 21, 2020
Chau Trac, Accounting Manager, Financial ServicesChau has completed more ctcLink training courses in Canvas than anyone else — 38 courses with an average score of 92.4. You read that right, 38 courses!
“I am very excited for ctcLink to replace the current system since ctcLink would allow us to do so much more automatically rather than manually in the current system we have,” Chau said. “In finance specifically, we will have better history records in ctcLink than in FMS where the previous records would go away if you replace it with new information.”
Her tip for tackling ctcLink training courses? Start early. She advises “not to wait until the very last minute. There is so much information we can learn in there that rushing it would not be an effective way to learn.”
Thank you, Chau, and paws up to you. (For more tips, read “Delta Dog Offers Tips for Tackling Training.”)
October 14, 2020
Justin Farris, Associate Director, Continuing EducationJustin has been getting courses into Curriculog, doing PeopleSoft course catalog build, and validating data, all while completing 13 ctcLink training courses. And if that isn’t impressive enough, he is also working on implementing Campus CE, which will make enrolling in Continuing Education courses easier for our students.
October 7, 2020
Kili Cambra, Curriculum Manager, Academic AffairsKili has been working extraordinarily hard, trying to manage her current job with building the course catalog and the class schedule in ctcLink. One coworker reports that “She and I have exchanged email questions as late as 11 p.m.”
August 10, 2020
Kili Cambra, Raegan Copeland, Justin Farris, Mondi Fournier, Jill Hammitt and Crystal KittermanThese Highline staff members started building out our courses in the live ctcLink environment. They converted 8,642 courses into the new system and put in many hours updating course information, leading the pack with the most updates completed by the end of the fourth day by all Deployment Group 4 (DG4) colleges. While this work will take more time to complete, these six stars helped us get off to a great start.
Ask Delta Dog
Who is this blue dog? Learn why Delta Dog has been our trusty companion on the journey to ctcLink. She will stay by our side as we fully implement the system.
If you have questions about ctcLink, ask Delta Dog.
You can also view the Frequently Asked Questions page.
For information about the statewide ctcLink project, visit the SBCTC ctcLink page and read the blog, ctcLink Connect.
