A new university technology base system will eventually bring about a new identification system and biweekly paychecks for students.

The Enterprise Information System Enhancement project, which includes installing the Banner system, began in March 2005 and is on schedule to be completely online by early 2008, said Bill Witsman, EISE project director.

One major objective of the new system is to have a universal database that will be accurate and easy to use.

Jeff Cooley, vice president of business affairs, said the new system will prompt changes including biweekly paychecks for student employees and new ID cards.

As information is converted to the Banner system, a new identification number will be given to everyone in the database to avoid using social security numbers for identification.

“The new system will be able to store more information,” Witsman said. “This way we’ll be able to give the university administration better information about our students, budget and employees so we can do a better job managing.”

The current system is outdated and inefficient because of duplicated information and the lack of communication between systems, Witsman said. Some of the current software was developed in the late 1960s and 1970s.

Witsman expects students to physically see the effects of Banner during class registration time of Spring 2007.

“All (student services) will be phased in roughly in the next year, year and a half,” he said.

Also, the three different payroll systems currently in use will be converted into one, Cooley said.

“What Banner will do is give us one integrated database,” he said.

The project has been split into five modules including finances, human resources, student, financial aid, and alumni and advancement.

Portions of the finance module are already online, and should be completely available for campus-wide use by July 1.

Consulting and uploading of the other four modules is in the works.

“We’re going to do a lot of training in the next few months,” Cooley said.

Eastern’s President Lou Hencken said the switch to the new system is going well, but he knows problems will crop up as plans progress.

“Any major switch like this will not be without incident,” Hencken said. “It really is going as well as is to be expected.”

About 800 other universities are using the Banner system, and Eastern is looking to them as examples.

“We have watched what other schools have done and we have learned from their mistakes,” Hencken said. “We’ve done everything we can to minimize negative effects, but we know there will be a problem or two.”