Today: Mar 29, 2024

Student opinions on the new Banner Student app

Sarah SheltonPhotos Editor

Over the summer, Banner Web seemed to disappear as the university updated it to Banner Student.

According to the university’s IT help desk website, “Banner Web is the Student Information System at SCSU. Banner Web is used to manage student records data and activities. Students are able to check admissions status, search course catalog, register for classes, check financial awards, pay tuition, check grades and apply for graduation.”

While Banner Student performs the same tasks as Banner Web, the format is entirely different.

This change was announced on August 10 in an email stating, “on August 16th BannerWeb will be upgraded to Banner Student. All of the existing resources (Student Services, Billing/Payments, Financial Aid) will still be available but with a new look and a much-improved mobile browser experience.”

One difference noticed among students is they cannot have multiple things open at once now. For example, if you have the schedule planner open and go back to Banner Student on the other tab and click on degree evaluation, the tab open for schedule planner closes and it opens the tab for degree evaluation.

“I’m not the biggest fan, but in some respects, it is better,” psychology major Sylvana Burno, a junior, said.

Burno said it is easy to find things on the new platform, such as her Grade Point Average, also known as GPA.

Similarly, interdisciplinary studies major Ariana Munoz, a senior, said she is not that bothered by the change, but was not sure how she felt about it at first.

“At first it was a bit off-putting because obviously, it’s different than what I was used to seeing in prior years so I spent a bit of time just clicking through trying to find where things are,” Munoz said. “It was a bit of a minor inconvenience in the first week or so but now I’ve just gotten used to it.”

While some students have figured it out by now, some still do not like the change.

Psychology major, Jacob Adorno, a senior, said he feels that Banner Student is more tedious to “get around.”

“I was a peer mentor my sophomore year and one of the main resources we offered for first-year students was helping them navigate Banner Web, help them navigate SCSU apps in general, but they’re mostly using Blackboard and Banner Web,” Adorno said. “I’m on it a lot now because I need to keep track of my activity for scholarships and any transcripts to be able to be eligible for the scholarships that I apply for because they need my transcripts.”

Adorno makes the point that it may be a good change for freshmen because they have to learn it anyway, but not for upper-class students.

“It is going to take us a while to get adjusted to it. Unlike those first-year students, we don’t have that much time to do so before it may come to bite us,” Adorno said. “At least Blackboard has not been changed, if it was Blackboard I would get nothing done. Everything would be late.”

Adorno said he appreciates the university for always attempting to make better changes, but some things are fine the way they are.

“It was fine the way it was. I don’t see the reason why they had to change it all that much,” Adorno said. “But the higher-ups had some incentive, had some purpose in doing so.”

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