Connections play a major role in Beacon; when connected to a student a success network member can access student information as-well-as generate a notation about the student.

There are several ways that an administrator can connect academic advisors, faculty, peer mentors, and other success network members to a student.

All methods require that both the student and the success network member have accounts in Beacon.  That is, that they are listed in the user list which is visible under Users and Roles. There are two(2) ways that a person can become a user of Beacon:

1. Log into the system at least one(1) time.

2. Be imported into the system by an administer.

One-to-One Connections

A direct one-to-one connection can be made in two(2) locations in the system.  First on the student's profile page under the Success Network heading. Secondly, via the Success Network Connections area in Settings.

Student Profile Page

As an Administrator:

1. Navigate to the Students profile
2. Click on Add Member
3. Search for a user to add to the student's network.  The user must be active in the system and hold the role of Peer Advisor, Advisor, Generalist, Executive, or Administrator
4. Click Add Members

Success Network Connections Area

As an Administrator:

1. Navigate to Management > User Management 
2. Find the student you are interested in via the Advisses or Unassigned tables
3. Click on View Connections
4. Click on Add Member
5. Search for a user to add to the student's network.  The user must be active in the system and hold the role of Peer Advisor, Advisor, Generalist, Executive, or Administrator
6. Click Add Members

 

Bulk Connections

As an Administrator:

1. Navigate to Management > User Management > Click on Blue Import Connections button in the upper right hand corner
2. Read the assistance text outlining the formatting of the import file
3. Choose the Role (Peer Advisor or Advisor) that should be automatically assigned to any unique identifier that is contained in the Advisor ID column of the import file. 
4. Upload your file
5. The system will indicate any errors that may have occurred

Performing this action will assign users with the Student role to a role of Advisor or Peer Advisor. 

When importing a Bulk Connections file a user with a role of Peer Advisor or higher will keep their current role in the system but will be added to the students Success Network.  This import will not lower a users role in the system.

For more information about best practices for building this file, please see Beacon Managed Connections.

Automated Bulk Connections

Beacon offers the ability for the bulk connection method to be automated via an sFTP file drop method allowing campuses to add connections to students on a regular basis without intervention from administrative users through the interface.  In order to establish this automated method you may need the assistance of campus IT professionals who are adept at extracting and transforming data from various campus system in order to generate a Bulk Connection file.  Once this file can be replicated on a regular basis it can be passed to a sFTP directory at Anthology that enables processing of the file.

For more information about establishing an automated bulk connection process for your campus please see Using sFTP to Load Bulk Data into Beacon and contact your consultant.

 

Disconnect Users

To disconnect users from students administrators can use the tools available on the Manage Success Connections section of the system.  Bulk disconnections can be identified in both the Bulk and Automated Bulk connection files.  Follow in-system prompts and help text for more information.