Kent State University’s Division of Information Services, in collaboration with the Division of Student Affairs, has completely redesigned the appearance and functionality of FlashLine. The new FlashLine was launched on July 13.
"Our core team and stakeholders have been actively involved with the development for over a year,” says Sameer Jaleel, director of systems development in the Division of Information Services. “Building out the architecture and infrastructure has been an ongoing goal of our division as we continually look to the future and try to anticipate the needs of the university community."
One of the most noticeable changes is that the appearance is vastly different from the original FlashLine or FlashLine Classic, with a more modern design and cleaner presentation of content. With the addition of My Dashboard, there has been a significant uptrend in users customizing their FlashLine experience. For example, 39,000 users have uploaded a profile picture. Similarly, more than 5,700 users have saved or pinned specific items to a personalized page, alleviating the need to locate frequently used items multiple times.
"We also listened to the university community who shared a voice in requesting a more efficient and effective FlashLine, a search function integrated into the site and a design that works seamlessly on mobile devices," says Cesquinn Curtis, executive director of administration in the Division of Student Affairs.
Some of the new features include:
- New Interface and Navigation: The information you need is faster to find and easier to understand.
- My Dashboard: Customize your FlashLine by pinning the items you use most.
- Employee Dashboard: View your paystubs and leave reporting.
- Personalized Notifications: Get critical, personalized and timely notifications delivered directly to FlashLine.
- Tailored Content: View the information that matters most to you.
- Search: Get to the results you need with the new portalwide search.
Faculty members will now have the ability to view notifications, which allow for critical and timely notifications to be delivered directly to FlashLine. Additionally, the search function will provide faster and more far-reaching capabilities. Faculty members who use My Courses in FlashLine Classic will find that some frequently used features have changed. The capability of emailing an entire class or individual students via FlashLine will still be available and is accessible directly from the roster of each course. However, faculty will no longer be able to upload files through FlashLine. Instead, Blackboard Learn will be the primary means of file uploading and sharing for both faculty and students.
Resources, videos and help articles are available at www.kent.edu/flashline. In addition, local desktop support is available to assist faculty and staff.
Issues should be reported to 330-672-HELP (4357) or via support ticket at http://support.kent.edu. Additionally, TechHelp in-person services are available to assist all Kent State faculty, staff and students.
