PCC Quote 1705 Bid Specifications.pdf

Request for Quotes

PCC Quote 1705

Registration Software Specifications for Continuing Education

Pueblo Corporate College, a subsidiary of Pueblo Community College located in Pueblo, Colorado, is seeking a registration software system for its continuing education programs.

These programs are predominately industrial and workforce training classes and enrollment is approximately 500-1000 students per year.

The software system should conform to the following specifications as listed below.

Quote submission requirements must include the return of:

A completed Bid Form

A completed Bid Response Questionnaire Form

Offers can also include additional documents as desired by the submitter.

The timeline for the quote process is:

Quote request submitted via Colorado VSS on October 31, 2016.

Period for vendor questions Oct. 31 to Nov.4.

Answers to questions published on Colorado VSS Nov. 5.

Quotes due on Nov. 14.

Questions regarding the quote should be submitted to the Director of Purchasing of Pueblo Community College at Edmond.iniguez@pueblocc.edu.

Questions will be answered as they are received and then published in toto on Nov. 5.

After Nov. 14, no other notification or communication will be made regarding the quote via the Colorado VSS system.

Notification of award will be made via e-mail to all submitting vendors.

Please see the following pages for system requirements.

mailto:Edmond.iniguez@pueblocc.edu

General Registration Software Requirements

The institution desires to obtain a system that gives them maximum control and flexibility to capture, manage, and edit their data. To that end, the system database must:

Allow administrative users to query the tables directly (without having to go through a proprietary reporting tool or limited search tool) using standard SQL calls.

Administrators (with prior approval from the vendor) should have the ability to write to the data tables, to update data fields, and (again after consultation with and approval from the vendor) have the ability to insert records into the core data tables.

Responsive Web Design Support: The customer facing pages must be “mobile friendly” and support users who connect via smart phone or tablet, as well as desktops. This should be done via Responsive Web Design, which would automatically size the user’s display based on the device accessing the web pages.

Software must allow for an unlimited number of concurrent users.

System must also support the ability to archive old course, registration and payment history, yet offer instant access to this historical data (for reference and reporting).

Vendor should have an established track record of user support. Evidence of this would include the availability of regularly scheduled training, a help guide that is regularly updated, sponsorship of an annual user's conference and have a minimum of five full-time professional support technicians. Preference would be given to vendors who use internal staff vs.

outsourced support.

Live system support must be available at a minimum, Monday through Friday, 7 am to 6 pm Central Standard Time, with the availability of emergency live support available 24/7.

The Vendor, as part of the system installation, must apply the institution’s web design (colors, images, basic navigation) to the customer facing pages.

Vendor must provide data conversion services and have demonstrated the ability to import data from our current registration package.

System must allow us to customize look and feel of customer facing pages based on templates and style sheets which can be modified by our webmaster. Pages that drive the web registration component should be standard html pages (to allow us to edit to fit our style, and those pages should support CSS).

Vendor must warranty the system for a minimum of one year. Vendor must allow our institution to request a full refund of the software purchase price (excluding training costs, and hosting costs) within that first year of use, should the software prove not capable of meeting our needs.

System must be cloud based.

Software licensing must provide for a perpetual license. While our organization desires a system that has a support and maintenance plan option, we require that the license for the system be a perpetual license, and that for the initial purchase price, our organization has the option to use the software in perpetuity with no additional required fees or subscriptions.

System should provide a method for individual staff/administrative users to customize their data entry screens: to hide unneeded data fields and, on a user by user basis, turn fields on and off.

Course Management Requirements:

System should allow for tracking an unlimited number of courses. System should allow staff to move courses from an Active to Inactive status (to allow for better management of programs).

Courses must have the ability to be listed (for web publishing or internal referencing) under multiple headings to allow us to “cross-list” course under multiple categories (eg: Manufacturing, Business, and Safety) without having to re-create the course multiple times.

System must have integrated support for managing contract classes. This should include ability to link a firm to a course, and to allow for a single billing entity for the total contract price of a class (yet also allow tracking of individual participants in the class.)

System must offer a method of bundling or packaging classes (to allow staff to create packages of like classes eg: The Desktop Publishing Package, or to promote a Certificate Program (Administrative Assistant certificate). A student could enroll in the “Package or Parent” course and be automatically enrolled in NN number of “child” classes. This system must also allow for open enrollment in the individual “Child” classes.

Must have ability to specify prerequisite courses and check the history of a student registering on the web to see if they met the prerequisite

System should facilitate the scheduling of class meeting rooms, include warning administrators of schedule conflicts, for both classrooms and instructor assignment.

Course management system must offer the ability for staff to define related courses (based on program manager’s awareness of program offerings) for courses. The customer facing pages should highlight these related courses when the customer lands on that course page. This would be an Amazon type “You might also be interested in… “ display.

Must be able to handle a robust faculty/instructor tracking system, including the ability to:

assign an unlimited number of instructors to a course set up a unique payment method and payment amount for each instructor

Define the Role/Function of each instructor

Track instructor skills, bio, schedule preferences, default honoraria amount and status

Record instructors student evaluation scores (minimum of 7 user defined Likert scale elements)

Must have the option to define an unlimited number of class tuition or registration fees (Early Bird Fee, Group Rate Fee, Late Fee, etc.), and an unlimited number of optional/additional fees (Parking Fee, Book Fee, etc.). Must be able to choose what fees are published on the customer pages. Must have the ability to define specified optional fees as Automatic (optional fees that are automatically added to a student's registration, such as a required Supply Fee, a Required Parking fee, etc.)

Must have an integrated course level program budgeting tool, which allows staff to input estimated costs, estimated enrollments, and have the system return the projected profit or loss and the minimum and go/no go enrollment figures.

Must be able to handle early-bird fees, and have them automatically expire based on a static date (all early bird fees expire on June 15th) or a set number of days (expires 14 days before the start of the class). The early bird fee dates/parameters must be able to be defined on a class by class basis.

System should be able to offer a link to reference documents (word documents, excel spread sheets, pdf documents, etc.) from the Course table and the Instructor table.

Courses must have the ability to track breakout sessions or other “event within an event” activities, such as pre-conference events and optional events (golf tournament, tours). These sub events must be able to have a fee assigned and must have the ability to set maximum size limits.

System must provide options for simplifying the course creation process. Once a course has been created, there should be an easy method for creating another section.

Student/Prospect Requirements:

Names table should allow for multiple open entry comment fields including the ability to track special needs, comments, and contact history (with unlimited text entry ability).

Names data entry should allow for automatic fill-in of city, state, county and area codes based on zip code.

System must support ability to add unlimited interest codes to the names table (for tracking, marketing, and reporting purposes). The codes must have a date stamp (to indicate WHEN the code was added) and the date must be editable.

Name Records should also allow a link to multiple reference documents such as a vitae, a contract, a transcript, etc.

System should allow storage of sensitive data (employee ID #’s, Social Security numbers, etc.)

as data elements (not key value fields ) and must offer ability to encrypt those data elements.

Names profile should have a minimum of 35 user definable data fields.

Name/Prospect system must allow storage of person data for inquiries (prospective students).

System should provide a method of seamlessly moving a name from prospect to student, as well as a simple procedure for removing /purging names for a variety of reasons (e.g. no contact within the last 2 years).

System should have multiple ways to protect against creation of duplicate name accounts.

Should also have a simple procedure for merging duplicate accounts (and preserving data that might be associated with the two separate accounts for the same person).

System must be able to associate a person record with their employer/company/organization as appropriate. A separate firm table should provide ability to identify firms by such things as:

company size, key contacts, physical location, billing location, industry type and links to all employees with that company.

System must also be able to create a person record that is not associated with a company.

System must be able to provide for capture and reporting of external credentials such as ablility to record classes a student may have taken from other providers; to store (searchable and reportable) as well as such things as: history of their employment, special skills, license #’s and other ad hoc data storage needs. This credential table should allow for an unlimited number of records for any student.

Must have ability to assign a fee preference status to a student and to have the appropriate registration fee automatically assigned during the registration process (student qualifies for “Staff Fee” or “Senior Citizen Fee”).

General Registration Management

System must provide for a simple straightforward method for transferring students from one class to another, and for transferring registrations from one student to another. This system should allow the system user to charge a “processing” fee for the transfer.

At the course level, system should have the ability to mass transfer (move registrations from all or selected students from one course to another) and have the money automatically move with the registration.

System should have the ability to Mass Enroll all students in one class into a second class (to simplify the process of “graduating” students from one class into the next level of the class).

System should support the ability to import registrations into a specific class (from an Excel or CSV file).

Payment Management:

System should allow for multiple payment types (cash, check, billing, Visa, MasterCard and Discover credit cards, and at least nine additional user definable payment types).

System should allow for a simple mechanism for staff to accomplish multiple payments for a single registration (pay part by check, part by credit card, part by alternate credit card and/or bill the balance to a company).

System should offer a full set of Accounts Receivable tools, including invoicing, aging reports, and third party billing.

System should offer ability to easily transfer money from one registration to another, yet maintain the original data on the initial payment (payer name, date paid, receipt number).

System should have a simple way to process refunds, to limit user errors during the process and facilitate data integrity.

Course Publishing/Student Self-Registration:

System must offer a variety of options for presenting courses to students and display courses in multiple formats, including:

Calendar format

By category

By location

By instructor

By time frame (courses coming up in the next 5 days)

By quick search (search for single keyword)

By Specific Criteria (day of week, instructor, location, time of day, date range, etc.)

System must allow a user to register others. The system should remember the registration history of a student, and allow them to recall names of others whom they have previously enrolled.

System should allow for customizing the types of data required on a course by course basis, for example Kids College requiring student age, t-shirt size, etc. and other general classes NOT having that data requirement.

System should offer an expedited checkout option (a one page check out form for courses that would be special events or one of a kind conferences).

System must support ability for course packaging: The ability to define two or more (up to 10) courses a part of a package or bundle. A student would be able to purchase the package (and get enrolled in all 2-10 courses that comprise the package) while still allowing other students to purchase single registrations in any of the courses in the package.

System must also allow students to log back in and pay balances on their account.

System must allow multiple student accounts to share the same email (husband and wife with same email).

System must be able to support multiple coupon discount features, including ability to

a) set individual course discount coupons

b) set a global discount for a user selectable batch of classes (batch method)

c) support a one-time use coupon (set by term for a selected amount)

d) ability to offer BOGO discounts (buy one, get one free promo types)

System must offer the ability for staff to define related courses (based on program manager’s awareness of program offerings) for courses. The customer facing pages should highlight these related courses when the customer lands on that course page. This would be an Amazon type “you might also be interested in…“ display.

Suggest Courses: System should offer the option to present to a returning student a list of upcoming classes that match their interest profile.

General Customer Service Features:

System should have an integrated method for automatically sending a reminder to students whose classes are coming up within the next week (Upcoming Class Reminder). System should also have an integrated method of sending a class follow up message after the class has completed. This system must have the ability for staff to review the list of classes included in the reminder/follow up to be able to edit the target class lists. Staff should have the option to send the messages via email or SMS text messaging.

System should have the ability to Mass Enroll all students in one class into a second class (to simplify the process of “graduating” students from one lower sequence class into the next level of the class).

Should have a simple to implement system for managing information requests such as tracking students who wished to have a catalog or brochure sent to them.

System must have ability to hold escrow accounts for students so a student who is eligible for a refund may choose to have their money stored as a credit in the system which can be then applied to a future course.

Must have integrated email support. This should include email confirmation of registrations (showing fees charged and fees paid), instant emails to students, quick drop emails to an entire class, mass (broadcast) emails to all students, and ability to email class rosters to instructors.

Should also have the ability to do a “one click” mass email to waitlisted students. This should be done without having to export and merge with other mail programs.

Should have the option to send SMS text messages to students.

Should have a procedure for emergency notifications of students for day specific warnings (classes cancelled tomorrow due to weather or campus shut down for public safety reason).

This warning should ONLY be sent to students who have a class on that specific day.

Financial Reporting and Management Requirements:

Must have an integrated PCI Compliant credit card payment option.

Credit Card Processor must be able to integrate with a variety of standard credit card processing networks including Cashnet.

System must provide an easy to manage system to track program/course/contract expenses per individual event/class/contract, in order to provide accurate profit/loss figures on a per class basis.

Financial reporting must allow for multiple ways of tracking receipts: by date of entry, by user, by deposit number assignment and by receipt number.

Reporting System

Software must include a full-featured built-in report writer that is accessible by a typical user can use and one that does not require exporting data and then having to deal with the data in a third party reporting application.

System should have a set of quick report tools at the data screen level (name screen, course screen, registration screen, instructor screen) that allow a staff user to generate a report within two or three clicks.

When generating Reports for Class Nametags and/or Class Completing Certificates, system should allow user the option to de-select students who should not receive a nametag/certificate.

Should have “Dashboard” functionality (whereby a user can get an instant view of critical information such as classes near full, classes with less than minimum, and quick views of things like Total Registrations to date (by day, by week, by month, by quarter, etc.), including the ability to show comparisons to last year.

Software must be able to import and export reports easily (between other software installations).

Reporting system should have a comprehensive statistical reporting system: at a minimum, offering the ability to run cross tab analysis of student demographic data by courses taken or any other criteria.

Reporting system must have a complete set of financial reports, including: Daily Income (daily deposit reports), course level revenue reports, profit and loss reports, Expense Detail reports, and Profitability ranking reports.

Reporting system should support on-the-fly SQL commands. This would allow an end user familiar with SQL to create their own database selects (for administrative user access).

Reporting system should have integrated support for generating report outputs in either PDF, RTF, EXCEL or HTML format.

Ability to generate reports for:

Mailing Labels Rosters Invoices Receipts Name Tags Certificates Daily Income Reports / Deposit Listings Profit and Loss statements (by class, department, coordinator, subject matter, etc.)

Course Income Reports Promotion ROI reports Course Enrollment Reports Faculty Contracts Transcripts (including tracking CEUS and hours earned)

Marketing and CRM Requirements:

System should offer tools to help program staff market courses and track enrollments.

Should have a tickler call back system, where a staff member can mark a student record with a call back date and call back notes. This system should allow staff to assign callbacks to other staff within the office.

System should track outgoing email messages and mail correspondence to record history of contacts with the student.

System should have multiple fields where open ended comments or contact history notes may be recorded. And there should be a simple method for quick searches of names based on these notes.

System should have an integrated email function that supports sending promotional emails.

System should have a way for a student to opt out of promotional emails.

General System Issues:

The system must include a full range of database utilities, including the following services:

o Duplicate Record identification reporting and merging (merge-purge ability) o Ability to import data from external sources o Ability to export data in multiple formats

System must allow for simple and ongoing CASS certification of the student database. This procedure must be able to be handled (data exported and changes imported) into the live system (without having to shut down the system for staff or students while the updates are being made).

The system should allow the option of creating a different set of web pages (a differently branded/styled “Storefront”) for different departments who may be wanting to use the software.

This multi-storefront model must allow selective display of different classes per storefront, different sign up account options, and different user requirements. The system should be able to create up to nine different storefronts on one base system.

Additional Features:

System should offer an attendance tracking system (where a user can indicate attendance on a specific class day, including # of hours present that day and an absence code)

Courses and Memberships: Courses must have the ability to be restricted (to specific members), and/or have the ability to set up discount fees based on the particular membership.

Vendor Qualifications:

Vendor must have at least 15 years of experience in developing and supporting registration software for continuing education, and should have a minimum of 200 successful installs in university/college continuing education settings.