Home phone number on applications - WHY?

Susan Ott

Does it make anyone else crazy that the applications still have the Home phone number locked and required? Let's face it, the majority of people do not have home numbers anymore. It forces parents to put their cell numbers in the Home field for all applications which then creates tons of clean-up removing that cell number after the fact. We don't want duplicate numbers in the Home and Wireless fields. We don't want the parent's wireless number listed as the student's home number. If it's current families applying for another child, it's cleaning up those same records for the second, third, and sometimes fourth time. And if you have ConnectRE, it's catching those before they process over to RE. This makes me crazy as the database manager trying to keep data standards in place and spending time cleaning-up fields that shouldn't have to be cleaned up in the first place. I also have issues with the application overwriting what's already in a record. If the parents don't fill in the business info on the application, but we have it filled in on their current record, it unchecks the currently employed box. The fact you can't require a certain format for phone numbers also baffles me. When there are multiple candidates that are siblings, it adds the parent business info multiple times. Blank business entries get added to the parents that don't work. I could go on and on...Am I alone in this? Has everyone else figured out how to keep these things from happening? If so, please share!

Coco Parham

I am in complete agreement!  Honestly, I gave up deleting home phone numbers if they are the same as cell numbers. AND every time I make an update, that is listed as a profile change so it makes that process even longer.


I also want an application that looks more like the transcript, where addresses and other information can be listed in blocks, so it is easier to read, I created an idea for that but nothing came of it.


Have you added the home phone change to the idea bank?

Candace Chesler

Susan - you are not alone. Actually - the Idea Bank contains a number of requests to allow for phone number formatting - including this one from 2015 - which has been "under consideration" for over four years. How much more activity do we need to generate regarding this request?

My work around for the home phone issue was to instruct parents to enter NA on the application if they did not have a home phone. I then pull a list of anyone with a home phone number of NA - and use the Data Import function in Core to remove those phone numbers. 

I do still end up with duplicates in the Home and Wireless fields - which I remove through Data Import as well.

I have not run into an issue with parent business information being duplicated with applications from an additional child - not sure if that is related to how the applications are being processed, but that has not been our experience. 

 

Nancy Cunningham

Yes, Susan, all these things make me crazy too!  The locked home phone field and why in the world in the year 2020 a phone field cannot be pre-formatted is ridiculous.  Preach!!

Sarah Bigenho

I agree! I go back in to delete cell numbers in the Home field, as well. While we are on the subject of phone numbers, why is Busines/College one field? Again, in the age of cell phones, not many alum have a college number, yet they do have a business number. And in other cases, some do want to share three (cell, business, number on campus - college - to reach them.

John Ronan

I agree with all above.

I think the 'locked' business needs to be revisited in general.

It's one of those features that I don't think was implemented with an experienced educator's/administrator's input .

 

Sarah Bienvenue

Hi Everyone, we'll be doing a re-visit of the application this summer and one of the top priorities is opening up more of the fields that are currently required/locked and cannot be changed. When I have a more concrete list, I'll let you know.


thank you,

Sarah

Coco Parham

Thanks, Sarah!

Tina Pappas

Thanks Sarah Bienvenue‍ that's so great! 

John Ronan

That's good news!

Thanks.

 

Corrine Duncan

Hi Sarah Bienvenue, just wanted to follow up on this post and see if you had more of a schedule when these updates will be taking affect?  Generally our Admission office will work during the summer to update the applications.  Or will these updates require a fresh start build of an application (instead of a copy from a previous application)? I noticed that I had to rebuild our inquiry to pull in the race field and some other changes made to those tables.  


Thank you!

Sarah Bienvenue

Hi Corrine, this is live now whether it's a form copy or a new one. We've removed the lock for country and home phone.


thanks,

Sarah 

Coco Parham

Thanks Sarah. Sometimes I wish we could make these changes to forms already in use.


Coco