BannerWeb Blues 'Hopes Dashed, Smashed, Crashed'

Author: Paul W. Gruber

Multi-million dollar technological systems are only as useful as the humans who back them up. Unfortunately, such is the case with Middlebury College's new BannerWeb system. Chances are, if you're reading this, you had problems with registration as well.

It's a shame that the College spent millions on a system that is limited by human error and inadequate training. Last Friday juniors and seniors woke before 7 a.m. to register for J-Term and were denied access ("click") again... ("click") and again.... ("click") and again, leading to mild frustration #1: "how annoying."

Monday, we woke again before 7 a.m., and many of us still could not register, leading to a more serious frustration #2 ranging from "I want to throw or kick something!" to expletives.

So, why couldn't I register? Was this a technological problem? No. This was human error and lack of human training. So who is to blame? BannerWeb itself.

Let me clarify something. I do not mind getting up at 7 a.m. to register. What I do mind, however, is doing everything I can to prepare for registration (my three "Registration Status" boxes were checked, were yours?), reading all the BannerWeb instructions and then being denied.

On Friday, all juniors and seniors had, more or less, the same problem, called "system error," so I will tell my story of what happened during round two (ding-ding! fight!) on Monday.

Warning: parts of this narrative may sound familiar.

After waking at 6:50 a.m., logging into BannerWeb (success! high hopes, though cautiously suppressed after Friday's crash), clicking incessantly and getting rejected, I called Information Technology Services (ITS) at 7:05 a.m. and 7:07 a.m. No answer, so I left a message. (To ITS's credit, they later called me twice to try and help out.)

Next I went to ITS. The folks there were very quick and helpful in analyzing the problem. My "Major Restriction" message meant something was screwy with my file and I needed to go to Forest Hall. So, off I went.

It turned out I was eligible for registration and I had the necessary prerequisites, but the less-than-friendly Forest ladies (receptionist excluded) couldn't fix my problem either, so they sent me to see "the coordinator" of an unnamed department, we'll call it X.

Apparently, according to the Forest ladies, Department X had had troubles setting up its BannerWeb page. (Aha! So folks knew there might have been a problem before there actually was one!) I was not amused.

"On the other hand," I thought, "if Department X is the problem, Department X is also the solution, and I will help the coordinator find it." (Hopes resurrected.) So, off I went again.

The coordinator's door was open, but she wasn't there. After waiting a few minutes, I glanced at her whiteboard, which read, "9 - noon, in Battell Lab basement, Banner admissions training." (Hopes dashed, smashed, crashed.) Shouldn't she have been completely BannerWeb-trained prior to our registration, not afterward? This was not promising, so I went home.

Through the course of the day I called and wrote e-mails to the coordinator, the professor of the course and others. At 11:49 a.m. I got a useless e-mail from the Coordinator: "E-mail the Prof. of this course ... to explain the situation and ask for an override."

I had already done that, so I phoned the coordinator to explain - as everyone told me - that it was she who had the authority to override the system. To which the coordinator replied, "Well, I guess I can look into that."

"Well, you better exert some effort. I certainly have!" I thought. "I'm no expert on BannerWeb," the coordinator added. "Oh, really?" I thought.

So who's at fault? Surprisingly, not the coordinator, at least not completely. She's just the guinea pig. True, it took yet another visit to her office for me to successfully register at 2:10 p.m. (I hovered over the coordinator as she hovered over a scribbled-upon BannerWeb instruction booklet, contemplating its technological intricacies.) Unsympathetic as I was to comments like "Banner is not my favorite subject" and "I generally need lots of caffeine to deal with Banner," the coordinator finally realized she could register me after all! Yay, it only took superhuman effort. I needed a nap.

Despite uninformed questions like "Is the deadline today?", I realized the coordinator was not totally at fault. BannerWeb is not only incredibly expensive, it's incredibly complex, and Middlebury has provided inadequate and/or incomplete BannerWeb training to its staff.

And here is BannerWeb's inherent flaw: in order for BannerWeb to work flawlessly, everyone has to become an "expert" in its operation. It's kind of like asking for world peace.

Then again, this declaration prompts the question, why were certain departments problem-free? One might also ask, if students could do it successfully, why not staff? These questions prompt further research that must be determined by the College administration.

I don't like complaining without offering constructive advice on how to solve a problem.

Therefore: Dear Middlebury College, please: a) train staff on how to use BannerWeb before you launch it, b) limit human error, student frustrations and wasted time by checking to see that staff can understand and prepare the system for successful operation and c) if all else fails, please sell the multi-million dollar BannerWeb back to its manufacturer and refund my tuition for the wasted days I spent trying to figure out what went wrong... or use the money to build more buildings. Yes! Perhaps that's the solution to all our problems - more buildings.

Note on the Author: Paul W. Gruber spends all his free time trying to register for classes.