Officials update BlueLink, class registration

BlueLink, the online portal for class registration and grades, is being updated with a new look and altered features.

Illucian, the server that operates BlueLink, will soon stop supporting the current version. The new site is slated to go live this weekend. 

“It’s just an upgrade to the system, and there’s really not going to be that much of a difference at first,” Registrar Charlie Monnot said. “When you go into BlueLink, you have all the channels and the tabs—that all is going away, and it’s just going to be the student information portal. It’s just a landing page, but it’s going to encompass everything, which I think will be very helpful.”

The link to the website will still be bluelink.okcu.edu. The website will open to a home page where announcements such as school closings from inclement weather will be, and it will have links to the OCU website, students’ OCU email, SharePoint, D2L, campus resources like the library and campus technology, and the BlueLink page, which Monnot said is the student information portal known as Star Access. This page will contain the employee tab, student financial services and the student tab, which will have links to GradStar, class registration and a new section titled Banner 9.

“Banner 9 will bring up your information,” said Sophia Snider, data systems and reporting specialist for the registrar’s office. “It’ll tell you about yourself, all your addresses, and that way you can go in here and you can change it a lot easier, whether it’s your personal email or your phone number or whatever.”

Monnot said most of the functions of BlueLink should remain the same, such as timesheets for student employees, but some functions will be made more convenient, such as registering for classes. Monnot said it will be similar to a shopping cart in that students will be able to select multiple subjects from a drop-down menu and will be shown every class from those subjects. Students then will be able to select individual classes from the list without having to enter a CRN number, as well as add multiple classes at one time without having to go back or resubmit the form. They then will be able to register for all of those classes at once while viewing their weekly schedule.

“I hate registering for classes, it’s so complicated,” said Hailey Doyle, psychology sophomore. “I’m a huge fan of drop-down boxes. It makes things really easy when you don’t have to scan the whole page for what you’re looking for, and it takes you directly to what you want.”

Doyle is also a website designer. She said a website should be clear and easy and not contain a lot of jumbled text, which can make finding specific things difficult. She said these are all problems with the current BlueLink site, along with links that don’t work, site errors and a lack of clear instructions that make it overwhelming.

But Doyle said what she has seen of the new site looks stronger.

“The first page looks exactly like what I would design a website to be,” Doyle said.

Snider said they want feedback from the students to be able to improve the site. Any suggestions may be emailed to her at ssnider@okcu.edu or to registrar@okcu.edu.