Philippine Collegian Issue 10

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Opisyal na lingguhang pahayagan ng mga mag-aaral ng Unibersidad ng Pilipinas - Diliman Tomo 90, Blg. 10 Agosto 24, 2012

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IN LINE WITH UP President Alfredo Pa s c u a l ’s “One University, One UP” vision, a flagship project dubbed as “Electronic UP” (eUP) will be implemented next academic year, aiming to connect and manage the information systems of all constituent units. eUP is a P745-million “massive digital interconnection project” that will use a US-made database management computer software called Oracle. This software includes five information management systems for efficient student, faculty, staff and administrative records, finance and property transactions, and data and document tracking. Oracle will ensure the generation of more “accurate data”, which will lead to improvements in administrative and academic services, according to the UP administration. For instance, in the case of the Socialized Tuition and Financial Assistance Program (STFAP), the new software might better prevent discrepancies in bracketing statistics gathered by the Office of Student Scholarships and Services (OSSS) and the Office of the University Registrar (OUR). Plans for the new program have

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e of eUP açad f y Isabella Patricia H. Borlaza

THE UP ADMINISTRATION IS SET TO PHASE OUT THE UNIVERSITY’S CURRENT INFORMATION SYSTEMS TO MAKE WAY FOR eUP, TOUTED AS AN INFORMATION MANAGEMENT SYSTEM AT PAR WITH THOSE OF INTERNATIONAL INSTITUTIONS.

HOWEVER, CONCERNS RAISED BY STUDENTS AND ADMINISTRATORS PROVIDE AN INSIGHT INTO WHY THIS AMBITIOUS PROJECT MAY NOT EXACTLY BE THE “UPGRADE” THE UNIVERSITY NEEDS.

been launched and introduced this year in several UP campuses, except Visayas. The software will then get a pilot run in the UP System Office, UP Manila and Open University campuses on April 2013. By the end of Pascual’s term, in 2016, eUP is expected to be fully-functional in all UP units. But several points of concern have been raised by UP’s homegrown web team and student leaders as regards the implementation of eUP. Beyond the expected hype over a technological upgrade, the system reboot may also be another step towards the commercialization of UP and state education.

System crash At present, there is a Computer Registration System (CRS) in UP Diliman (UPD), and the cost of replacing this already functioning set-up with Oracle’s Student Academic Information System (SAIS) is a “budget misprioritization,” critics say.

Balita SAIS is one of the five management information programs under the Oracle software which is focused on student, faculty, staff and administrative records. Six of the 13 applications featured in SAIS are already in UPD’s CRS such as class enlistment, online dropping, and student records tracking, according to a document of collated questions and concerns from various UP offices dated August 3. Since Oracle is ready-to-use, automated processes will be standardized and additional Continued on page 3


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