CUNYfirst Hands-on Introduction for Faculty Advisors and Departmental Administrative Staff
*** Handout (version: Mar 10, 2013) ***
These sessions are intended primarily for faculty advisors who are now entering permissions directly into SIMS and need
to learn how to do this and other advising related tasks in CUNYfirst. Also for faculty/staff retrieving class rosters
and/or entering textbook information for other faculty, people labeled as ‘super users’ in our current system.
Sessions covering the four basic tasks for all faculty will start March 18, 2013.
For the latest information about CUNYfirst at Hunter visit: http://www.hunter.cuny.edu/cunyfirst
An electronic version of this handout plus links to detailed help documents (with annotated screenshots) are available
from an internal web page located at: http://maxweber.hunter.cuny.edu/~mkuechle/cf/
This site is updated frequently and also contains up-to-date information about any technical problems with the training
site.
While you may want to take notes during this session, don’t worry about missing something. This page above has links to
“quick guides” which walk you through everything we will cover. Here is the agenda; we will focus on the first two items:
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Looking up Student Transcripts
Granting permissions to register for a specific class/section
Viewing Placement and other Test Results as a Faculty Advisor
Looking up Class rosters
Entering Textbook information (if time allows)
Looking up Student Summary Information (e.g., to find a student’s ID; if time allows)
Using CUNYfirst more efficiently: “favorites” and “saved searches” (if time allows)
To get started, please note an important difference:
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CUNYfirst “production site”: https://home.cunyfirst.cuny.edu/ versus
CUNYfirst “simulation/training site”: https://cnyeptst.cunyfirst.cuny.edu
You have been asked to “claim your account” on the production site and to check the accuracy of the personal information
HR has on file for you. If you have not done it yet, please claim your account as soon as possible. If you have claimed
your account at another CUNY college, you don’t have to do it again, this is a CUNYwide account (like your CUNY
Portal/Blackboard account). The production site will include the new functionality only after the “go live” date – in the first
week of April.
Therefore, we will use the simulation/training site not the production site in these sessions. Unfortunately, you need to
claim your account separately for the training environment. If you have not used the training environment before,
leave the boxes for “user name” and “password” on the login page empty and click the “first time user” link at
the bottom. Write down the password (you select) and the user name (given to you in the process), and – upon
confirmation of successful completion of the account claiming process – return to the login page and use your new login
credentials.
By the way, the user name is the same on both “production” and “simulation/training”. It follows the pattern:
[First name].[last name]xx , where xx are the last two digits of your “empl-ID” (given to you during the account claiming
process). Example: Manfred.Kuechler95 (no spaces).
A few things to keep in mind about the simulation/training site:
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It contains real data -- both your own personal data (including SSN, salary, and date of birth) and actual
enrollment data for students from spring 2013 and going back many years.
o Never share your password with anyone, not even with your best friend. She/he will not steal your
identity, but she/he may not be as careful as you are.
o Keep all FERPA requirements in mind, treat the data with the same care as when working in SIMS.
In contrast to the production environment, the simulation environment can only be reached from a computer with
a Hunter IP address (a desktop at Hunter or a laptop using hunternet). Of course, there are ways to reach your
Hunter desktop (left running) from home; e.g., using Chrome Remote (recommended for techies only).
You will continue to have to access to this site after this introductory session; and we expect it to be available for
training purposes throughout the spring semester (except for a brief maintenance period after the expanded
production site has gone live in early April).
Not everything works perfectly in the training environment; the conversion program has serious limitations and
many things have to be done manually. A few examples: instructor names show only for one class meeting per
week; courses do not have any restrictions like (major requirement, co-reqs, etc.); advisors can grant permissions
for classes beyond their departments. All this will be FIXED when production goes live in April, but we don’t have
the time and staff to do this twice.
CUNY recommended browsers: Internet Explorer on Win, Firefox on Mac. However, Firefox usually works well
on Win. But if you experience problems (especially with login), try Internet Explorer instead. Also, you need to
allow “pop-ups” for the training site. Otherwise, certain things will not work like viewing a student transcript.
Details on how to do this vary with the browser (version) you use.
Always start with a fresh browser (close ALL browser windows and restart the browser); especially, do not try to
login to both “production” and “simulation/training” during the same browser session.
In addition to logging in with your own credentials (username and password) and having access to particular features as
determined by your “role” and associated “rights”, you can also explore how CUNYfirst/Campus Solutions works from a
student point of view. To do this, use one of the following two (generic) student identities:
User name
Student1.Hunter03
Student2.Hunter04
password
ID
Welcome123! 23150903
Welcome123! 23150904
You will be able to search for courses and simulate registration for spring 2013 (however, the simulation environment
mimics an ideal world where every course you want is available and there are no restrictions) as well as access your
unofficial transcript. – Many people feel that they get a better understanding of the CUNYfirst system by looking at it from
a student point of view as well. But this is an optional exploration, not essential to performing your tasks. It’s like logging in
to eSIMS now (have you ever?). If you have, you will quickly realize that CUNYfirst brings major improvements for
students.
The new CUNY/empl ID
The CUNY ID (not to be confused with the CUNY Portal ID, needed for access to Blackboard) allows unique identification
(of students, faculty, and staff) in CUNYfirst. It replaces the combination of partial SSN, DOB, and other pieces of
personal information we are currently using in SIMS. And having several students named Wu, Li, Williams, or Rodriguez
in one class is not uncommon at Hunter; so searches by just name often do not lead to a unique result.
You can also use the generic (fake) students shown above and their IDs, if you can’t think of a real student’s name and/or
want to save the time looking up this student’s ID while exploring (but check out the quick guide listed on first page to be
prepared for the real thing).