Wittenberg administrative personnel will see some changes in the student-system software Feb. 1 when the yearlong R-14/15 project becomes a reality.

“The new system software will have a different look and feel,” said Karen Hupp, director of administrative computing and project leader.

Datatel, Inc., a privately held company that provides advanced information technology solutions services to higher education, rewrote its student-system software in 1998.

The rewrite, which Wittenberg purchased, will affect the offices of admissions, the registrar, student accounts and residential life. “Everything that the university has recorded about a student will be affected,” Hupp said.

Once implemented, however, “the new system will make tracking the student easier and more efficient.”

Although the upgraded software will serve the university better, it has required the university’s computer specialists to rewrite Wittenberg’s current student-system software.

“We have had to convert all of our data,” said Hupp, adding that this has involved reprogramming the software and redefining the computers’ processes so that old database programs, files and processes could work in the new system.

In addition to rewriting the system to match Datatel’s upgraded student software, the university has also had to develop new software for those peripheral campus locations not specifically covered by Datatel’s upgrade but still affected by it.

These locations include the career center, math and writers’ workshops, mailroom, security and the campus switchboard.

Two programming analysts, two information-technology coordinators and three Wittenberg Datatel interns have tackled the mammoth rewriting task, along with two consultants from Twenty-Three Consulting.