Admissions Applications and Inquiry Forms Set up
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Admissions Applications and Inquiry Forms Set up

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Article Summary

About Inquiry and Applicant Portals

The inquiry and applicant portals allow inquires and applications to flow directly in to Campus Cafe. These portals may be publicly exposed on the web or may be internal. Institutions may employ a mix of inquiry and admissions forms and expose some or all of them on the web.

You may create different customizable forms for different types of prospects.  Below are some common examples of inquiry and application forms that might be created, although there is no limit to the number and type of forms that may be created.  

  • Day Inquiry
  • Continuing Education Inquiry
  • Graduate School Inquiry
  • Day Application
  • Continuing Education Application
  • Graduate Application

Considerations when Creating a Portal

Before creating a portal, consider whether one or more portals will be needed.

  • Portals support only one application deposit amount, one deposit amount and one enrollment deposit amount. If different populations are charged different amounts, a different application will need to be created for each population.
  • Portals are categorized as an inquiry or application. Applications offer more functionality and imply more than passing interest in the institution.

Portal Colors

The portal colors of tabs in a portal and certain fonts and buttons are controlled in the Color Customization tool.

  1. Navigate to Admin > Color Customization
  2. Adjust the colors under Admissions Forms
  3. Click Save
  4. Refresh the cache by navigating to Admin > Refresh Data Cache > reload data

Create a Portal

  1. Navigate to Admissions > Adm Portal Config
  2. In the Create a New Configuration box enter the name for the new portal
  3. Click Add
  4. Next to the newly created portal, click the pencil icon; complete the fields a necessary and click save
    Drop Down Item Text: The words that will appear in the drop down on the master admissions portal
    Site: The admissions site.
    Default Billing Site: The default billing site for the student's session data. May be overridden by placing this field in the application itself or by an administrator after the application is received. NOTE: Setting a default billing site will override any student site settings for an applicant's billing site. To allow the Applicant's billing site to match their student site, leave the Default Billing Site unconfigured.
    Description: A long description of the portal
    Mode: Inquiry will treat individuals submitted through the portal as inquiries; Application will treat individuals submitted through the portal as applicants; Inactive will disable the portal
    Application Type: These institution defined values can be used to distinguish among different types of applications, for example undergraduate vs graduate. These options are set in STParm ACAPTY
    Login Automatically And Bring to Payment Page (App Mode Only)?

    Defaults

    CE Code: If set to a Y or G if will populate the Continuing Ed Code on the applicant detail
    Academic Hold Code: An academic hold to automatically apply to any individual who submits an application. This will only occur if the applicant has a degree row. Institutions can configure at what admissions stage a degree row is created by adjusting custom control AD100, Sequence 1.
    Group Assigned to User Record: The permission group the individual is assigned to by default
    Default Member: The default activity tracking member to associate with activities part of the application
    Major: The default major if no major is specified on the form itself. The major must also appear on the list of majors accessed by clicking the Edit Majors button

    Schools Inputs

    These fields control the number of previous school fields displayed on the form.

    Amount Charged

The fees to post, transaction codes must be created and associated with the below fees. To accept payments online, the institution must have a contract with PayPal or Authorize.NET. See the application fee and deposit documentation for further setup.

App Amount: The application fee

Deposit Amount: The fee required to hold the applicant's spot in the upcoming class. Typically this is applied toward a future tuition bill.

Housing Deposit Amount: A deposit toward housing

Editable Sections of This Form

These fields support CSS and HTML, including the use of images. Their corresponding fields must be selected on the field list to show.

Header of Main Form: Text appears above the form itself. For example, this may include the school's logo or application directions.

Footer of Main Form: Text that appears at the bottom of the form itself. For example, this may include the school's contact information or links to policies.

Text above school fields: Text that appears above fields where the applicant indicates prior institutions attended. For example, this may include directions on which schools to report.

Text before Submit Button: Text that appears above the Submit Button. For example, this may include a disclosure statement or asking the student to attest the information is accurate.

This section controls emails that trigger upon submission of the form. Emails can either be specified directly in the boxes or via an activity tracking template. Activity tracking templates support merging information such as the person's name.

Important
If an activity/workflow is configured to trigger an email, the Web App Config items ADMISSIONS_EMAIL and SUPPORT_EMAIL must be configured with a valid email address to serve as the sending address.

Tracking Item Added to Inquiry Upon Submission Of This Form: Email sent to the inquirer when the form is indicated as an inquiry under Mode. Must be configured for applications as well. The activity set here will never trigger. However, this box must contain an activity for the Tracking Item Added to App When Placed Into the Holding Table to work.

Tracking Item Added to App When Creating New User Name & Pass: Email sent to the individual completing the form (if marked as application under Mode) if a username and password is created upon submission of the form.

Tracking Item Added To App When User Name & Pass Already Existed: Email sent to the individual completing the form (if marked as application under Mode) if a username and password already exists is created upon submission of the form.

Tracking Item Added To App When Placed Into the Holding Table: If Campus Cafe detects a the individual may already exist in the system, it will place the record in a holding table. A notification can be sent to an administrator to review the record. Must also assign a ID number of in the below box for this function to work.

Assign Tracking to Id# The Campus Cafe ID number of the individual responsible for resolving records that enter the holding table. This box must be completed with a valid ID number for the activity listed in the Tracking Item Added To App When Placed Into the Holding Table box to work.

Email Sent When The Comment Field is Filled Out

Text in the Comment Forwarding Email: If the Comment field is selected on the form, an email will trigger. Information in this box will be contained in the email.

Comma Separated List of Recipients of the Comment Forwarding Email: If the Comment field is selected on the form, an email will trigger to email address(es) in this box.

After submitting a form, the system can display a confirmation page. This page supports CSS and HTML.

Confirmation Page Text: This text appears after the submission of the form. If left blank the message "Thank you for requesting further information on Scan University..." will appear.

Late App Fee Payment Confirmation Text:

Text of Email And Confirmation Page When Form is Saved: This text appears when the individual completing the form chooses Save and Return rather than submit

Choosing Majors to Appear on the Form

This button requires permission 892.

  1. On the Admissions Portal Config for the desired form click Edit Majors
  2. In the Major drop down choose the major to appear on the form
  3. To the left of the major check the Included box
  4. In the Custom Description box optionally enter a description that will be shown on the form
  5. In the Display Order box enter the order in which the major will appear
  6. Click Add New Major Record
  7. Repeat steps 2-6 for each additional major

Choosing Minors to Appear on the Form

This button requires permission 892.

  1. On the Admissions Portal Config for the desired form click Edit Majors
  2. In the Minor drop down choose the minor to appear on the form
  3. To the left of the minor check the Included box
  4. In the Custom Description box optionally enter a description that will be shown on the form
  5. In the Display Order box enter the order in which the minor will appear
  6. Click Add New Minor Record
  7. Repeat steps 2-6 for each additional minor

Choosing Semesters to Appear on the Form

This button requires permission 893.

  1. On the Admissions Portal Config for the desired form click Edit Semesters
  2. In the Semester drop down choose the semester to appear on the form
  3. In the Display Order box enter the order in which the semester will appear
  4. Optionally, check the Default Semester For Config to use that semester as the default semester if no semester is selected on the form
  5. Click Add New Record
  6. Repeat steps 2-5 for each additional semester
  7. Click Submit All Changes

Note: Semesters will need to be updated as they pass.  Previous semesters may be removed on this page by clicking the red 'x' and then adding new semesters as outlined above. Once you are finished updating the semesters to appear on the form, click Submit All Changes.

Choosing Student Sites to Appear on the Form

This button requires permission 1154.

  1. On the Admissions Portal Config for the desired form click Edit Student Sites
  2. In the Student Site drop down choose the site to appear on the form
  3. In the Display Order box enter the order in which the student site will appear
  4. Click Add New Record
  5. Repeat steps 2-4 for each additional site

Choosing Fields to Appear on the Form

Campus Cafe delivers many fields out of the box. Data entered in to these fields will appear in fields on screens within the platform. Custom questions may be created as well.

Add Delivered (Out-of-the-box) Field (Question)

  1. On the Admissions Portal Config for the desired form click Edit Fields
  2. Next to the field to include on the form, check the box under Included. The field will move up or down in the list of fields depending on its tab and field order
  3. To change the label for the field, double click the text under the Label column and type in new text
  4. To change the tab on which the field appears, double click the number under the Tab field and change it
    Note: Campus Cafe supports up to six tabs. To rename the tabs, click the included box next to each tab (identified as a T under the Type column). Tabs can be renamed by double clicking their label and typing a new description
  5. To change the order in which the field appears, double click the number under Field Oder and change it
  6. To make the field required, check the box under the Required column
Note about international addresses and phone numbers
To have the address and phone number fields switch to international format, put the country address field before the other address and phone number fields and also select the providence and postal code fields.

Special Fields

Gender Field

The gender field provides two system-define options: male and female. These options may not be adjusted and are designed to work with delivered processes and the IPEDS report; IPEDS only recognizes male and female as gender options.

Race Field

The race field should be used in conjunction with the Hispanic field. The system-defined options for these fields may not be adjusted and are designed to work with delivered processes and the IPEDS report. Refer to IPEDS documentation for additional information about how to collect racial information.

Institutions wishing to define ethnic or racial categories may wish to consider using the Ethnicity question in addition to the Hispanic and Racial Background fields. The Ethnicity background options are defined using STParm SBETCD.

Manually Add Custom Field (Question)

To add a custom field requires creating an admissions header (the question) and trigger(s) (the answer(s)) and attaching those to the form. Optionally, they may be attached to an activity tracking template so the answers may be queried en masse.

Create question (header)

  1. Navigate to Admissions > Template Requests
  2. Click Admissions Portal Template Request Headers
  3. In the Group ID to Add box enter a brief description of the question that will be used for setup but not seen by the applicant
  4. Click Add
  5. The Request Type Drop Down Menu tells the system how to render the answers to the question or whether the request header is a hidden request or information text. The options are:
    Hidden Value: This will not be displayed on the form but will be included for anyone who submits through this form
    Information: Allows you to add informational text between questions
    Multi-Values: The answers will appear in the form of multiple check boxes
    Single Value: The answers will be displayed in a single select drop down menu
    Text Area Value: The answer will be an open text box where the prospect can type free form text
    Text Field Value: The answer will be in a smaller text box than the Text Value
    Required (check box): tells the system if the answer to this question should be required
  6. Choose the display order that allows the user control over where the question appears in the additional information section of the form
  7. Description (200-character limit): This is the actual text that will display as the question on the form
  8. Click Save

Create question answers (triggers)

For questions with single value or multi-value responses, set the allowable answers (responses) through triggers. For text-based answers, a trigger still needs to be created to hold the text.

  1. Navigate to Admissions > Template Requests
  2. Click Admissions Portal Template Request Triggers
  3. In the Group Id to Add box, select the group corresponding to the question
  4. Click Add
    Trigger Name (10-character limit): the trigger name is used to associate the trigger with a template form (note the special use of the SBPRCC and ACDECD fields for special triggers based off of code changes to the prospect record. See the applicant page section for more detail) This is for internal setup use only and does not show to the applicant. Important: Trigger names must be unique among all triggers.
    Trigger 2 Name (10-character limit): Not in use
    Display Order: Controls the order in which the answer (trigger) is displayed under the question (Template Request Header)
    Trigger Event Type: 
    Description: The text of the answer (trigger)
  5. Click Save
  6. Repeat this process for additional answers

Add question to form

  1. Navigate to Admissions > Admin Portal Config
  2. For the application to edit, click the pencil under edit
  3. Click Edit Fields
  4. Click Jump to Tracking Options that will bring you to the bottom of the page custom questions appear
  5. Click the checkbox under Include to include the question on the application.
  6. Click the + button to show the available answers for questions with multiple answers. Click the include checkbox for any answers to include. If no answers are selected, the question will not appear.

Tie question to activity 

For a question to appear on the application only a header and trigger needs to be created. However, Campus Café recommends tying each question to a workflow and activity. This will allow the results to be queried via activity tracker.

  1. Navigate to All Users > Activity Tracking Templates
  2. For member, choose Admissions or desired member
  3. In the Template Name box enter a way to identify the response (trigger) This may be the name of the trigger itself, the response the applicant selects or something else. You must create a workflow for each and every answer.
  4. Click Add
  5. In the Description box enter the response/answer
  6. In the Admissions Portal Request Trigger choose the related trigger (response/answer)
  7. Click Create WorkFlow From Template
  8. Click Cancel (not save)

Create dynamic custom question

By using constraints, a custom question can be set to show dependent on the answer to an initial question. Criteria can only be delivered questions (headers), not custom questions and applied only to custom questions. The custom question to be shown or hidden must include a header and trigger.

  1. Check the far left box next to the trigger associated with the question
  2. Scroll up and click the Edit box
  3. In Constraint Field 1: choose the field that will drive whether the question is shown
  4. Constraint Operator 1: choose the logic
  5. Value: enter the value to be tested
  6. Optionally repeat for Constraint 2
  7. Click Update

Changing Tab Titles

Tab order is hard-coded
While tab titles can be re-named, they are hard-coded in terms of their order.  Tabs can be included or excluded, but reordering the included tabs will cause mismatched tab titles on the form from what is intended in the Edit Fields screen. 

The hard coded tabs are in this order:

  1. Intro Tab
  2. Contact Information Tab
  3. Address Tab
  4. Parent Tab
  5. Academic Information Tab
  6. Additional Information Tab
    (ex. including Intro, Contact Info, Address, and Academic Information Tabs, but setting their tab order and names as Intro, Personal Background, Biographical Data, and Academic Information will not display in that order on the form. On the form, it will appear as Intro, Biographical Data, Personal Background, and Academic Information, with the incorrect fields displaying on the middle two tabs)
  1. Navigate to Admissions > Admin Portal Config
  2. For the application to edit, click the pencil under edit
  3. Click Edit Fields
  4. Tabs are indicated by the type T under the Type column
  5. For a tab to appear, the included box must be checked
  6. Locate the tab title to change and double click the label (under the label column)
  7. Type in a new tab name
  8. Click elsewhere on the screen; the new name appears automatically

Add/Edit Custom Field (Question) from Single Screen

Custom questions can be added from a single screen, completing many aspects of the above process in one action. Access to this function is from permission 1271, under the Admissions Permission Container. This process will create the Admissions Portal Headers and Triggers, activities, and workflows in one process. The custom field add/edit screen can be accessed from the Admissions Portal Config screen, or from the Edit Fields screen within a specific Admissions Form configuration.

Add a Custom Question Video Tutorial


Directions


Clicking either of those buttons will allow access to this screen:

To create a custom field (question) from this form, select either "Add A New Question" or "Add Answer To Existing Question" from the drop down menu:

-Enter a "Group ID" - this will be the Tracking Template Header value that appears as the question on the Edit Fields screen for a form. 

-Determine a type - this will be the permitted response:

-Enter a Label - this is the actual text of the custom field to be viewed on the application, such as "How did you hear about us?"

-Enter a Tab Number and Tab Order - this is the tab and order on which the custom field will appear on the application by default. It can be edited within each individual form. 

-You may set the default to "Required", which may be changed within each individual form.

-Enter an ID for each permitted response - these will create the Tracking Template Trigger values.

-Enter a Label for each Answer ID - these will be the actual text of the displayed response.

-Choose a category for each label - these will be the type for the created workflow (actual categories will differ based on your system settings): 

-Choose a mode (This will determine the mode of delivery for the created workflow):

The Order value will auto-fill. Admissions Portal Triggers can be dragged and dropped, and the Order value will auto update accordingly. Once saved, the system will create all requisite variables, though, the workflow will not contain any additional data or settings (such as email recipients or message contents).

Each custom field added via this method will be added as an option to all forms. To add it as an included field on a form or forms, enter the form name at the top in the Forms field. It can be added to multiple forms at the time of creation, or when adding to an existing question.

Adding answers to an existing question allows more responses to be added, but not deletion or editing of existing responses.

Collect Emergency Contact on Application

An admissions portal can be configured to ask the applicant to specify one or two parents. By default, parent 1 will be assigned an emergency priority of 1 and parent 2 an emergency priority of 2. The individual will the lowest emergency priority will show on the applicant or student's profile page.

Collect Parent Info on Application

  1. Navigate to Admissions > Adm Portal Config
  2. Next to the application to collect parent information click the pencil icon
  3. Click Edit Fields
  4. Parent 1 information is collected through fields that start with Parent 1. For example, Parent 1 First Name, Parent 1 Last Name, Parent 1 Email. Next to each data element you wish to collect, check the included box.
  5. Parent 2 information is collected through fields that start with Parent 2. For example, Parent 2 First Name, Parent 2 Last Name, Parent 2 Email. Next to each data element you wish to collect, check the included box.
  6. The changes save automatically

Use Parent Fields to Collect Emergency Contact Who Is Not a Parent

The application system does not provide a dedicated emergency contact field. However, one or both of the Parent information fields can be repurposed as dedicated emergency contact(s). Put another way, you can collect an emergency contact in lieu of parent info.

  1. Navigate to Admissions > Adm Portal Config
  2. Next to the application to collect a dedicated emergency contact click the pencil icon
  3. Click Edit Fields
  4. For the emergency contact use the Parent 1 or Parent 2 fields. For example, if using Parent 1 as the emergency contact you may wish to include Parent 1 First Name, Parent 1 Last Name, Parent 1 Email, etc. Next to each data element you wish to collect, check the included box.
  5. For the parent being used as the emergency contact field, double click the label and change it to say Emergency Contact rather than parent. For example, if using Parent 1 as the emergency contact, change Parent 1 First Name to Emergency Contact First Name
  6. For the parent being used as the emergency contact, add the Parent Relationship field. For example, if using Parent 1 as the emergency contact include the field Parent 1 Relationship 1.
  7. Double click the Parent Relationship label and change it to say Your Emergency Contact's Relationship to You. This will allow the applicant to specify how the emergency contact is related to them. (e.g. aunt, uncle, spouse, etc.)
  8. The changes save automatically

Turn Off Emergency Priority for Parents

By default Campus Cafe assigns Parent 1 emergency priority 1 and Parent 2 emergency priority 2. The individual with the lowest priority will appear as the emergency contact on the student's profile page. This default assignment of emergency priority may be turned off.

  1. Navigate to Admin > Custom Control Maintenance
  2. Locate ProgramId WEBINQRELA
  3. Next to Sequence 1, Parameter 3, click the pencil icon
  4. In the Parameter Value 3 box enter 0
  5. In the Parameter Value 4 box enter 0
  6. Click Save
  7. Refresh the cache by navigating to Admin > Refresh Data Cache > reload data

Preferred Parent Settings

Parents may be flagged as preferred when being added through admissions forms.  By default, both Parent 1 and Parent 2 are set as preferred. To change this setting to only Parent 1 preferred, set MSPARM WEBINQRELA-1-6 to N.

There are two MSPARMs that control the preference flag value for each parent: 

Parent 1: WEBINQRELA-1-5: Y = Preferred, N = Not Preferred, Default Setting = Y

Parent 2: WEBINQRELA-1-6: Y = Preferred, N = Not Preferred, Default Setting = Y 

Copy a Form/Portal

  1. Navigate to Admissions > Adm Portal Config
  2. In the Create a New Configuration box enter the name of the new form
  3. Click Add
  4. In the Copy From drop down choose the form to copy
  5. In the Copy To drop down choose the form you created in step 2
  6. Click Copy

Public URL for Form

Each form has a publicly accessible URL (web address link) that can be placed on a website or other web platform.

To determine the URL

  1. Navigate to Admissions > Adm Portal Config
  2. Next the the form desired click the pencil icon
  3. Click Edit Fields
  4. Click Go To Form
  5. The public URL appears in the URL bar on the browser

Application Payment Fee Page

If a payment vendor is integrated with Campus Cafe to collect an application fee, after an application submission, the applicant will be brought to page showing the application fee and instructions. The application will be submitted to the system regardless of whether the applicant pays the application fee online. The text of this page may be customized. For example to include a note that the application has been received and offer an alternative method of payment such as a check.

  1. Navigate to Admin> Adjustable Text Maintenance
  2. Click the pencil next to PAYMENTS_APP_FEE_CLOB
  3. In the large box, enter the text, including an HTML or CSS
  4. Click Save
  5. Refresh the cache by navigating to Admin > Refresh Data Cache > reload data



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