NextGen Student: Minnesota State outlines phased Workday Student rollout, pilots, and student‑centered design; trustees raise advising and AI questions

Minnesota State presented a NextGen Student update outlining the Workday Student implementation timeline, governance, pilot work and early design priorities; trustees and presidents asked how the platform will affect advising, transfer mobility and companion systems.

Project scope and timeline: staff said the system formally launched the student phase on December 2 after a board approval and contract execution. Early readiness work included demonstrations and pre‑planning; staff are developing prototype configurations for the college and university sectors during 2025–2026. Workday Student will be deployed in a phased, student‑life‑cycle way: the project will turn on admissions/recruiting functionality first (students enrolling for 2029), then progressively enable registration and degree‑progress functions so continuing students can complete 2028–29 year processes. Staff said the goal is to be fully live on Workday Student for 2029–30 academic operations.

Why systemwide alignment: system leaders explained the implementation’s stated goals are a consistent, mobile student experience across campuses, reductions in duplicate companion systems where Workday can natively provide functionality, and tools to make degree progress and planning clearer. Vice Chancellor Bailey emphasized equity goals (Equity 2030), noting that degree‑progress visibility and analytics should help advisers and students identify at‑risk students earlier.

Key features and companion systems: presenters demonstrated Workday Student screenshots highlighting academic‑progress dashboards and drag‑and‑drop academic planning tools that feed into registration. Staff noted Workday will need integration with companion systems the campuses use today (CRMs such as Slate or Salesforce for recruiting, degree‑audit tools some campuses use now) and that the program will follow a “Workday‑first” approach: where Workday can provide a function, staff will evaluate whether to use Workday instead of a separate product.

Governance, readiness, and third‑party owners’ rep: staff described multi‑level governance that leverages campus communities of practice and a program steering committee, and introduced a third‑party owner’s representative (CampusWorks) to help ensure industry best practices. CampusWorks executives (Jean‑Paul Spagnolo and Joy Hatch) will advise on adoption and change management.

Advising, AI and training concerns: trustees asked whether student self‑service and AI tools might replace human advising or degrade quality. Project staff and campus leaders said their goal is the opposite: build tools that reduce administrative friction so advisers can spend more time on higher‑value, student‑centred conversations (career planning, program fit, equity‑related supports). The project will include student engagement and training (multimodal onboarding, student focus groups) and plans to embed student and adviser feedback early in prototyping.

CRM and pre‑matriculation work: staff said prospecting and pre‑matriculation workflows will continue to use campus CRMs; Workday offers a light CRM for very small campuses but larger recruiting and analytics tools remain companion projects and will be integrated with Workday Student.

Next steps: staff plan leadership workshops, continued prototype demonstrations in late 2025, and sector pilot design through 2026, with phased configuration for each campus beginning thereafter. Change management, communications and student training are embedded project responsibilities.

Why it matters: trustees and campus leaders said NextGen Student presents an opportunity to simplify student interactions across campuses, improve degree‑progress visibility and support transfer mobility, but they cautioned that implementation success depends on training, governance and protecting the human adviser role.