Salesforce.org Summit Awards Honor Excellence in Education

At the 6th Annual Higher Ed Summit, among the stellar plenary speakers, Salesforce.org honored trailblazers in higher education at the Summit Awards. The Saleforce.org Summit Awards are a celebration of community and innovation, with award winners voted on on the Power of Us Hub. This year, we had nearly 1,000 community members vote on the winners! Congratulations to all of our nominees. Now let’s meet this year’s winners!

Excellence in Student Success Award: UMass Lowell

The Excellence in Student Success Award recognizes a college or university that is using Salesforce to blaze new trails to student success.

UMass Lowell demonstrates excellent student success outcomes through a campus-wide CRM strategy and their Solution Center. Retention and graduation rates have improved dramatically through their use of Salesforce. Currently, there are 250 Salesforce users across 10+ departments focused on student success.

Excellence in Operational Efficiency Award: Florida International University, Enrollment Management & Services

The Excellence in Operational Efficiency Award recognizes a college or university that is using Salesforce to streamline processes and maximize adoption in one or more areas of the campus.

Florida International University uses data collected from case generations to decrease calls, call times, and visits to their OneStop. They have also successfully improved their process and communication strategy with Salesforce. Since FIU went live in Oct 2015, they have supported over 638,000 cases.

The Dave Perry Overall Excellence in Innovation Award: Indiana University, UITS

The Excellence in Innovation Award recognizes a college or university that is using Salesforce to fuel innovation in recruiting, student success, advancement, marketing, community and/or engagement.

Indiana University is a pioneer in embracing the Connected Campus vision. They have successfully implemented Marketing Cloud enterprise-wide with 300 business units sending email campaigns with sophisticated journeys. Currently, Indiana University is sending approximately 40 million emails annually. They will be adding SMS and live message in 2018. Seven of nine campus locations have standardized on a custom built Recruitment and Admissions solution that is integrated to Marketing Cloud and their SIS.

This award holds a special meaning for our larger Ohana as it is named for Dave Perry, a Salesforce.org employee who passed away in 2017. Dave was a technical architect who made significant contributions to the development of Higher Education Data Architecture (HEDA) and to the Salesforce higher ed community.

Congratulations to all of our nominees and winners. You are truly trailblazers, making the Education Cloud ecosystem a better place!

If you use Salesforce at your college or university, check out the Power of Us Hub and keep learning at Higher Ed Office Hours. (Or get a recap of happenings in the Power of Us Hub “HubCap” here.)