AU Student Transition update

The Student Transition project is the holistic coordination and transfer of approximately 50,000 students to Adelaide University. Each continuing student's transition will be supported by an individualised study plan (or detailed communication for Graduate Researchers) to their Adelaide University program, with student enquiry support in place for a smooth student experience.

This work is being led in the Student Experience and Administration (SEA) Domain by Student Transition Lead Vanessa Matthews, who coordinates broadly across the whole program to ensure a smooth and well-supported transition for all student cohorts, and Senior SME Lead: Student Transition Mel Friend, who is focused on transition of all continuing coursework students.

To achieve this, Vanessa and Mel are working with a wide range of staff to connect into transition work and track dependencies across Domains and BAU areas and facilitate the development of integrated and coordinated transition and communication plans. If you are undertaking any work on student transition, or have any questions about how your project work intersects with this project, please contact Vanessa or Mel so they can ensure efforts aren’t duplicated and communications are aligned.

Significant collaboration on this project is already underway across multiple domains, primarily Curriculum, Systems Integration, Graduate Research, Market & Partner Engagement and IMO Communications to enable:

• Integrated and timely student communications
• Identification of risks and mitigation strategies to manage program transition pathway mapping and transition study plan generation
• Generation and distribution of study plans
• Coordinated and timely student support and enquiry arrangements
• Timely staff updates on the progress and change impacts of student transition.

Cohesive and aligned approaches are planned, with a focus on minimising disruption to students, providing clear and consistent communication, project planning and milestone alignment, risk and impact identification and management and alignment of Transition Principles.

A detailed student transition communication plan has been endorsed and our first major communication to students about transition is planned in the next 6-8 weeks. This communication, along with all future student communications, will be shared on the SEA Domain Intranet page for all staff to access. A link to the student transition key messages, which will form the basis of our upcoming communication to students, is already available on the SEA Domain Intranet page, as is a link to the Adelaide University Student Experience Vision.

The next phase of the student transition project includes conducting a study plan pilot on a small number of programs, utilising capability being developed by our IT colleagues to enable the generation of the first draft study plans using student enrolment data and program transition statements, before SMEs will quality assess the trial plans. The pilot will then inform the approach to generate all study plans in 2025, ahead of distribution of the plans in time to support 2026 enrolments.

Over the coming months, staff involved in student transition activities will be provided with regular communications, training and support as we move closer to 2026.  

Tom Steer and Prof. Jennie Shaw
Student Experience and Administration Domain Lead and Alternate
Joint Committee, Building a new Adelaide University
Chancellery and Council Services (CHA)
Chancellery (CHY)