Purpose

To allow the production and maintenance of Acknowledgment, Outcome and General Letters for direct Admission Applications. In particular, to advise students of specific details concerning the status of their application.

Anticipated Frequency

As required

Structure

Blocks

Admission Application

Buttons

Produce Letter (middle block)

Reject Letter (middle block)

This form is accessed through ADMF3000, via the Application button (bottom block), then through ADMF3240 via the Letter button (bottom block).
Admission Letters include Acknowledgment and Outcome Letters, functionality provided by the Acknowledgement Letter button in ADMF3240, as well as General Letters which are manually created directly in this form. Acknowledgment and Outcome Letters are Correspondence that can be created to indicate to a student the status of their application for Admission to a course. General Letters can be tailored to any purpose the institution requires. Precisely what details are contained in the Correspondence is determined by the institution. The institution's specialist user(s) are able to configure the template/s, parameters and rules for Correspondence to determine how detailed each Correspondence Item is. General users are able to tailor each letter to reflect the information to be provided to the applicant. (In general, this information is of a specific nature that cannot be determined by the application status.) The information provided here and for related forms is for a 'typical' setup.

Stages of Admission Letters

Letter Entries

Letter Entries are records that have been automatically created for either an acknowledgment or an Outcome Letter in ADMF3900. These entries have been created by either the Acknowledgment Letter button in ADMF3240 or the changing of an Outcome Status in ADMF3240. Letter entries are set to 'composed' when they are created. Letter entries for General Letters are manually inserted into this form when required.

Composed Letters

Composed Letters are letter entries that the user has determined are suitable to be sent out and may be produced via the batch letter production. Only Composed Letters which do not have an issued date will be considered by the batch process.

New Acknowledgment Letters

Typically, Acknowledgment Letter entries are created prior to an outcome status being recorded for the application, if the appropriate Step Type access has been defined for the Admission Process Category. For example, an Admissions user would record the details of the student's application, including the Course Details, Qualification and Documentation status. Once these details have been recorded by pressing the Acknowledge Letter button, an entry is created in ADMF3900 for the Acknowledgment Letter. This letter entry can be modified by adding additional phrases or text (if permitted) and can be produced by the Produce Letter button if desired. Alternatively, Acknowledgment Letters that have not been issued and are composed can be produced via the Admission Letter Production(ADMJ5300) and Batch Letter Production (CORF2540) processes.

New Outcome Letters

Typically, Outcome Letter entries are created once an Offer Status other than PENDING has been recorded for the application, provided the appropriate Step Type access has been defined for the Admission Process Category. For example, an Admissions user would determine the outcome of the student's application including Conditional Offer and Deferral statuses if applicable. Once these details have been recorded, by saving the modified Outcome Status an entry is created in ADMF3900 for the Outcome Letter. This letter entry can be modified by adding additional phrases or text (if permitted) and can be previewed and printed if desired. Alternatively, Outcome Letters that have not been issued and are composed can be produced via the Admission Letter Production(ADMJ5300) and Batch Letter Production (CORF2540) processes for particular Outcome Statuses.

New General Admission Letters

General Admission Letters can be created for an Admission Application at any time and for any purpose. For example, a General Admission Letter could be created to request further information in support of an application. Such a letter would be of a particular Correspondence Type and have a specific Template associated with it.

Produce Letter button

The Produce Letter button invokes Microsoft Word, where the appropriate template is obtained, and information from Callista is merged into the appropriate places. Where applicable, additional text is inserted into the letter. This text can be provided by the rules facility of Callista or via the allocation of phrases or text to Letter Parameters (see Admission Rules and CORF2510 and CORF2520 and CORF2550).

This letter can be printed from Word and sent to the student. Alternatively, to print the letter (along with other letters) in a batch job, it is necessary to reject the letter. Produced Letters create an issued date and reference in CORF2320 for the student. The issued date and reference prohibit the re-production of the same letter entry.

Note: This function is not supported for MacOS based client browsers.

Note: When printing the letter from Microsoft Word 2003 and 2007, a Header Record Delimiter box may ocasionally appear, prompting the user to enter the delimiter characters, '|' and '^' to successfully complete printing the letter.
Setting the Default Language in Microsoft Word to: 'English (United States) - US' has been found, in some instances, to prevent this from occurring.

Reject Letter button

The Reject Letter button deletes the issued date for a letter from CORF2320. Letters that have not been issued via the batch letter production process are able to be rejected. Rejecting an issued letter maintains the letter entry, allowing phrases and text to be added or deleted as appropriate. The letter entry and previously saved phrases are maintained.Once saved, the letter can be reproduced via the batch job (ADMJ5300) or the Produce Letter button. Only letters that have been issued by the Produce Letter button can be rejected by the Reject Letter button. To reject letters that have been issued by the batch job see CORF2540.

Note: This function is not supported for MacOS based client browsers.

Maintain Phrases button

The Maintain Phrases button navigates to CORF2550 which allows the creation and maintenance of phrases.
The Phrase Text box allows specific and uncommon text to be added to a Letter Parameter Type PHRASE.

Correspondence Templates

Correspondence Templates are configured by institutions to meet the needs of Admission Process Categories. For further information on Correspondence Templates (see Admission Letter Template Production).

Features of this Form

The Admission Application block contains:

• Person ID
• Sex
• Date Of Birth

The Admission Application Letter block contains:

• Correspondence Type
• Description
• Issue Date
• Cor. Ref. Number
• Composed check box
• Details

  Buttons

  • Produce Letter
  • Reject Letter

The Admission Application Letter Phrase block contains:

• Letter Parameter Type
• Phrase Code
• Order
• Phrase Text

  Button

  • Maintain Phrases

Rules/Notes:

An underlying check on the Admission Application Admission Method Type is carried out when defining which letters can be assigned to which Admission Application. This caters for the change to Admission Process Category. See Design Specifications for further details.

Use this form to create/maintain Acknowledgment, Outcome or General Letters for a student's application for Admission.

On entering the form, the specific letters that are able to be produced appear in the Admission Application Letter block. General Letters must be manually recorded after entering the form.

Select the letter to be issued. If no letter appears or all the letters have been issued you can create a new letter.

To assign particular Phrases or Text, select the Letter Parameter Type. Letter Parameter Types are values that have been defined by the Admission specialist as being suitable for additional phrases or text to be added. An example would be a Letter Parameter Type called ADD_DOC which would require the user to indicate additional documentation required before the application can be processed, or before the offer can be confirmed.

Select the Phrase Code or enter the Phrase Text to assign to a Letter Parameter. A Phrase Code is assigned to particular text. This allows institutions to determine standard text to be used for Correspondence. Phrase Text can be entered for non standard text.

Indicate the Order of phrases/text to determine their order in the letter.

Use the Produce Letter button (middle block) to preview the letter and/or print the letter for distribution.

Use the Reject Letter button (middle block) to change the letter to Not Issued.

Use the Composed check box to indicate the letter's status. Letters with the Composed check box selected will be created by the batch job if requested. Uncomposed letters will not be created.

A letter entry is created with the Composed check box selected.

In the Maintain Admission Process Category System Letters form (ADMF2M34), the template which will be used to produce a letter is recorded. The file 'control.doc' must be in the 'client's' c:\tmp directory and the required template must be in the specified template directory.

Selectable parameters in the Letter Parameter Type LOV are confined to those assigned to the letter in CORF2520.

Only letters issued via the Produce Letter button can be rejected by the Reject Letter button. To reject letters that have been issued by the job ADMF5300, use the form CORF2540.

When a letter has been created, the appropriate entry appears in CORF2320.