| Wayne RESA
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Background
Wayne RESA is a regional educational service agency that provides a
broad spectrum of services and support to Wayne County's 34 school
districts aimed at improving student achievement and maximizing
economies of scale in staff development, purchasing, and
administrative services. Services range from curriculum consulting
and staff development, helping districts maximize technology use in
the classroom, software applications for district student and
administrative services, group purchasing and more.
Wayne RESA also provides state-mandated functions including pupil
accounting and special education monitoring and compliance. RESA is
the largest regional educational service agency in Michigan and
among the largest in the nation.
Situation
The RESA Administrative Technologies division serves 65 school
districts, public school academies and other intermediate districts
throughout the State of Michigan that are members of the Wayne RESA
Computer Consortium. RESA's Computer Consortium provides training,
support and application development in specialized areas of study.
The Consortium relies heavily on computer software and hardware
components, and these systems that support the training must be in
peak performance.
The IT department was using a help desk software tracking system
to log requests for repair and maintenance issues. However, the previous
system was not effective because the software had to be loaded on
every workstation throughout the entire support department. When the
technicians were out on a service call, they could not view new or
urgent tickets coming in. Support calls were falling through the
cracks, tickets were getting lost and service times were delayed.
An additional burden to the IT department was the requests that
came into the office for instructions on how to perform common
tasks. Each request was managed in person by telephone and email.
The staff had to take the time to personally respond, and the
requester had to wait to get the information.
Strategy
RESA saw the need for a web based system to manage their support
requests. After evaluating several vendors they chose the Novo
Customer Support Suite (CSS). The Novo CSS combines a web based help
desk with a powerful knowledge base system.
After a speedy set-up, the Novo help desk was a simple transition
for the technicians. As a result tickets could be viewed remotely
when the techs were in the field. RESA administrators set up the
business rules feature to track ticket times - now if a ticket is
not responded to within a defined time period the administrator is
alerted so that the ticket is addressed in a timely manner.
RESA also put in place a knowledge base system to provide quick
and easy access to information addressing common issues. Articles
include procedures and best practices for resolving common problems,
instructions for the help desk, etc. What's more, utilizing the
"permissions" feature, RESA is configuring portal views so
that the knowledge base content is dispensed based on the end users
predefined
roles.
Results
RESA now boasts a much more organized help desk system. IT staff are
using their time more efficiently, tickets are not falling through
the cracks and knowledge base visitors are getting the information
they need on demand, without having to interrupt the IT department.
In addition to the functionality, RESA is especially pleased with
the quick set-up, ease of use and configurability of the system.
RESA states, "The support this software has given our staff has
been invaluable - it has been a feather in my cap since I made the
decision to purchase the Novo
Solutions software."
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