Banner, Metro State's administrative system for managing student, financial aid, finance, HR and accounts receivable information, will be upgraded to version 7.1 from version 6.x in October.

Implementation of the upgrade requires a three-day outage, so Information Technology is giving the college community advance notice so that they can plan for it. The outage will begin at 6 p.m., Thursday, Oct. 6, and will be completed at 7 a.m. Monday, Oct. 10. IT and some user-area staff will work the entire weekend, posting upgrades and testing the systems.

Banner online, self-service items on MetroConnect, Web payment by credit card and Banner Imaging will all be unavailable during this time, however the outage will not affect MetroConnect, e-mail, access to network drives and online classes.

Online training for Banner 7 will be available on the IT training Web site beginning early in September. Watch for a separate announcement.

Why move to Banner 7?
With Banner 7, not only will Metro State be keeping up with technological changes and staying current with our vendor-supported software, but there are new features that will improve Banner and the self-service (Banner Web) portions. Some of those features include

• an upgraded Web interface with tabs and drop-down lists;
• improved access to self service/Banner Web through MetroConnect channels;
• better prevention of the creation of duplicate identification records for individuals;
• security features that better protect student, faculty and staff identities; and
• additional value-based security features that will prevent others from modifying information controlled by an office.

Will the customized CAPP Report still work?
IT already has had many questions about whether or not the customized CAPP report will continue to work in Banner 7. The answer is yes, however users will have a few extra steps to take when it comes time to printing the report. More information on the use of CAPP with Banner 7 will be published in a mid-September article.