California State University (CSU)
California State University (CSU) slashes grant processing time for students across its 23 campuses from 4 weeks to 3 days by using Boomi to connect PeopleSoft and other financial systems.
Business goals
The California State University (CSU) enrolls 450,000+ students across 23 campuses annually. It periodically evaluates the academic and student data stored in PeopleSoft to determine eligibility for Cal Grants. These grants are issued by the California Student Aid Commission (CSAC) when students meet specific academic requirements.
To determine eligibility for Cal Grants, CSU and CSAC took 4+ weeks to process grants. To help students in need remain enrolled, the two organizations decided to speed up the grant processing time.
Integration Challenges
To establish Cal Grant eligibility, the financial aid team at CSU’s 23 campuses manually bundled student data from PeopleSoft and sent it via FTP to CSAC. CSAC then manually opened files, analyzed data, corrected enrollment records, and confirmed eligibility.
This process was time-consuming, taking a month to complete. Students who became eligible during this period had to wait another month.
While CSU could modernize its ERP system, this could be costly and time-consuming, and might not accelerate grant processing.
How Boomi Helped
The CSU Chancellor’s Office adopted Boomi, managed on AWS by Unisys, to provide API services across its 23 campuses. Using Boomi to build APIs and integrations, the Chancellor’s Office standardizes digital services, saving IT time and costs across CSU.
One of the first API services collects Cal Grant data from PeopleSoft and transmits it to CSAC in just days where it previously took a month to collect the enrollment information from campuses. The solution is live on eight CSU campuses.
Results
Once fully deployed across 23 campuses, the Boomi API will extract data for 170,000 potential recipients 10x faster than previously, accelerating the roster analysis phase. This will reduce IT manual work across the CSU while accelerating the issuance of 20,000 additional grants annually, directly helping students.
The Cal Grant solution models CSU’s plan to improve digital experiences for students, faculty, and staff through Boomi API-powered solutions. The CSU has over 100 active Boomi users and 200 certified staff.
