Horizons Tips & Tricks: "Streamlining Program and Scholarship Applications"
For those who don’t know, Horizons is Symplicity’s cloud-based solution for managing all aspects of the study abroad process. The Horizons team focuses on ensuring that our clients are able to seamlessly control even the most minute details of their students’ study abroad journeys.
What if you want to limit the number of study abroad or scholarship applications each student can submit per semester? Or maybe students feel they’re increasing their chances of being accepted by submitting an application for the same program or scholarship multiple times. As administrators, you want your application database to remain clean and organized and match your institution’s policies – which is why Horizons allows you to customize the application limits for each of your study abroad programs or study abroad scholarship offerings.
Limiting Program Applications
There are some useful settings available to managers to help limit the number of new program applications a student may begin.
To access the settings for program applications, navigate to Tools > Preferences > Modules Settings > Application subtab > Limitation Per Term.
You will then see three options for editing:
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You may enter the maximum number of applications that an applicant can begin for any given term/session. (You can override this number per specific terms/sessions by navigating to the Programs > Terms list on the left navigational menu. Edit the term/session and enter the maximum number allowed per applicant in Number of Applications Allowed. This is helpful if your program application limit is three per applicant, for example, but for summer sessions, you want to allow up to five applications.)
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You may warn or prevent an applicant from starting an application to the same program of an existing application.
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You may warn or prevent an applicant from starting an application to the same program and term of an existing application.
Limiting Scholarship Applications
Some institutions offer scholarships that applicants may use towards study abroad opportunities. In Horizons, the scholarship module offers independent scholarship applications and/or integrated program and scholarship applications. When using a scholarship for independent/non-integrated scholarship applications and selecting ‘Yes’ to Available for Specific Terms, managers may set up limits to the number of applications started by students for those terms/sessions.
First, navigate to Scholarships on the left navigational menu and click Edit on the desired scholarship. Then, click on Settings > Edit > Available for Specific Terms > Yes > Select the desired Available Terms.
Now, navigate to Tools > Preferences > Modules Settings > Scholarships subtab > 1. Maximum Number of Scholarship Applications per Term. (You may override the number of scholarship applications per term/session in Programs > Terms on the left navigational menu. Once there, edit the term/session and enter the number in Number of Scholarship Applications Allowed. This is useful if the global setting limit should be expanded or reduced for any specific term/session.)
Contacting Symplicity Support to Complete Set-Up
The next step is to contact Horizons’ Support team to let us know which Pre-Acceptance Application Statuses should count towards the limit if using setting #1 above for program applications. For instance, some schools don’t count withdrawn or waitlisted applications but do count incomplete, pending, conditionally approved and approved applications.
Likewise, you’ll also have to contact our support team to let us know which Pre-Acceptance Scholarship Application Statuses should count towards the limit when using the setting to limit these per term/session. For instance, some schools don’t count withdrawn or not approved scholarship applications but do count incomplete, pending and approved scholarship applications.
Once we hear from you, we will update your system’s Application Status Tool. You may contact support by submitting a ticket under “Issues” in the Client Neighborhood or by calling the Horizons Support Desk. We’re always happy to help!
