State and federal travel and risk management reporting requirements grow more complex while institutional office staffing remains stagnant or even declines.

From the Minnesota Office of Higher Education: “In 2014, the Minnesota Legislature passed legislation requiring postsecondary institutions to report on the health and safety of study abroad participants and directing the Minnesota Office of Higher Education (OHE) to assess the appropriate state regulation of postsecondary study abroad programs.” The report from the OHE goes on to clarify the requirements that will be instituted at the state level, including reporting of all accidents or illnesses, deaths of program participants, and health and safety standard compliance. What does this mean for institutions in the state of Minnesota? Simply put, it means the addition of stringent state reporting requirements on top of Clery Act reporting requirements already in place at the federal level. It also likely sets a trend that many other states will adopt in the near future. For example, New York state is instituting mandatory violent and disruptive incident reporting for campuses in the state.

How can institutions manage to keep pace? What processes can be put in place to guarantee that study abroad and non-credit travel is accurately tracked on campus?

Terra Dotta software’s web-based travel tracking and reporting tools enable institutions to collect key traveler info in a simple, straightforward fashion and to use that collected data to facilitate meeting reporting mandates at the state and federal level. Discover how Terra Dotta software can assist you with your travel tracking and reporting requirements.

Don’t miss the Travel Risk Management Summit in January where sessions and networking opportunities will focus on these crucial office processes. Click here to learn more and register for the Summit today.

Gary Rhodes, Ph.D.,
Associate Dean, International Education & Senior International Officer
California State University at Dominguez Hills &
Director, Center for Global Education

This is the 16th Anniversary of International Education Week in the US. Since November 2000, the U.S. Department of Education and the U.S. Department of State have collaborated to highlight international education issues for one week of the year. For U.S. college and university international educators, this has also been an opportunity to implement various activities to highlight study abroad, international students, and other international initiatives on campus. Some years, there will be a statement by the U.S. President. Most years the U.S. Secretary of State and U.S. Secretary of Education will make a statement about the importance of international education.

Read the full article >

Scott Burkett is a Systems Architect and Information Security Officer. He maintains a highly available, secure server environment that hosts Terra Dotta software. This includes tasks related to the security of our websites and databases, capacity planning, disaster recovery, and managing the day-to-day operation of our system administrators and database administrators.

Prior to working at Terra Dotta, Scott served as a systems administrator for over twenty years in higher education, at both UNC-Greensboro and UNC-Chapel Hill.

Scott received a B.S. in Biology from UNC-Greensboro in 2005 and is currently enrolled in a M.S. in Information Technology and Management program at UNC-Greensboro.

Outside of work, he is an avid cook and plays basketball any time he can find a hoop. Scott is an adventurous eater, but maintains that few things in life are better than slow-cooked pork and a bit of bourbon shared among friends and family. Scott says his favorite part of working at Terra Dotta is that “Terra Dotta provides a highly dynamic work environment with new questions and challenges to address every day. These challenges are met with the collective talents of a group of professionals that are dedicated and highly motivated to come up with solutions for our clients. The combination of this type of teamwork and the resources that are made available to our staff by the management team is rare in my professional experience and highly appreciated.”

Presenter: Steve Sweitzer

You have learned the basics of how the new task and workflow systems function in TDS 15, but how can you start putting them to work most effectively? This webinar will go through a detailed implementation and demonstration of a few different types of workflows that you can start automating your office processes with these new tools. This webinar will cover both the building of the workflows themselves as well as configuring the triggers that will get them running.

NOVEMBER 18 4:00 PM EDT

Presenter: Mark Landon

Learn how you can get more from your Terra Dotta software. Terra Dotta's Professional Services department has a variety of offerings designed to enhance your experience and provide added value. Join Professional Services Manager Mark Landon for a detailed explanation of some of our most popular professional services. We will cover our Administrator Service, Professional Training, our Tune-up Service and Terra Dotta Visualizations. You will come away with an understanding of what these services are, exactly what is included, costs, and why they will help you get more value from your Terra Dotta software.

DECEMBER 2 4:00 PM EDT

Click here for a list of all of our upcoming webinars.