Frequently Asked Questions
Click on the topics below to learn more about frequently asked questions.
Documenting Interactions with Students
What should go in appointment summaries or notes?
Check out our resource guide for best practices and guidance on documenting interactions with students in Navigate NC State.
Availability
What is the difference between setting availability for appointments vs. campaigns?
Appointments allow students to schedule meetings on their own by either using Navigate Student, or by logging into Navigate.
Campaigns allow you to push out an email to your students that contains a unique URL allowing them to schedule their appointments. The campaign is most often used for shorter periods of time, such as during registration advising.
If you set availability for campaigns and not appointments, the only way students can schedule an appointment with you in Navigate is if you create and send the campaign email.
Which option should I choose under the section, “How long is this availability active?”?
This depends on the length of time you wish to be available to your students for appointments. Selecting a date range gives you more control over your calendar and availability. Selecting “Forever” is generally not recommended because your availability may change from semester to semester. In this case, it is best to simply update your availability at the start of each term.
If I select the current semester under, “How long is this availability active?”, what dates this will cover?
If you select the current semester, the date range will cover the first day of class through the last day of finals for that semester.
Appointments
Can students book same-day appointments in the system?
While most of our services at NC State choose to require 24 hours notice, this parameter is location-specific.
What is the difference between a Note and an Appointment Summary?
Both Notes and Appointment Summaries will show up on a student’s History tab in Navigate.
A note is not specific to an appointment. The note feature is often used to document an action or approval that was taken on behalf of a student. For example, you might want to document that a student received approval to substitute a different course for a requirement in the major. Additionally, you can choose to share the note with the student, which will be logged in his/her Navigate account.
Appointment summaries are specific to an advising appointment that took place. The summaries documents what college or program the appointment was for, the reason for the appointment, and other elements that might be useful to know about the appointment. This facilitates easy reporting functions in the system, where you can pull data on all of your appointments for specific colleges/programs and appointment reasons. Currently, there is no option to share an appointment summary with a student.
I made an error in my Appointment Summary. Can I fix it?
Yes, if you re-open the appointment summary, you can hit the ‘Edit’ button below and make the changes.
Why are my appointments appearing as if they are duplicated?
If you are using Navigate to schedule appointments, they will automatically appear on your homepage under “Recent Appointments” once the appointment takes place. To add an Appointment Summary for a specific student, you should always go to your homepage in Navigate and click on Actions under Recent Appointments, then “Add Appointment Summary.” This will associate your appointment summary with the scheduled appointment. You will end up seeing duplicate appointments if you try to add the Appointment Summary directly from the student profile, rather than from your Staff Homepage in Navigate.
Calendar Syncing
If I add a meeting within my Google calendar, will it be blocked off in Navigate?
Yes, as long as you have synced your calendar, it will not show up as an available time for your students to book an appointment.
Can students book over existing appointments on my Google Calendar?
No, as long as you correctly sync your NCSU Google Calendar with Navigate, students cannot book over existing calendar events on your Google Calendar. However, events on your Google Calendar MUST be set to “Busy” and not “Free.”
Appointment Campaigns
If I send out my campaign now, how soon can students start booking their appointments?
Students will receive an email with a unique link to schedule their appointments on the date you identified to launch the campaign (on the “Define Campaign” tab). The dates students can sign up for will depend on the date range you selected when you set up your campaign.
For example, if you set your campaign to run from April 1-April 25 and you set it to launch on March 20, students could immediately start signing up for appointments, but the first available slot wouldn’t be until April 1.
Can I send out a campaign for group advising?
Yes, you can create an appointment campaign for group advising by setting the appointment slots to more than one student when creating the campaign. If you have more than one-time slot available for group advising, please ensure your group appointment campaign is not overlapping with any other existing availability in the system. This could cause complications with students signing up for the wrong appointment slots. If you have questions about the best way to set up group advising campaigns, please contact Advising Technology.
Student Lists
What is the difference between a Student List and a Saved Search?
A Student List is a static list of students by student ID. You can use Student Lists in a variety of ways, from maintaining a list of students to track over time, to sending messages or appointment campaigns directly from the Student List.
Saved Searches allow users to conduct a pre-configured Advanced Search without having to manually and repeatedly create a new Advanced Search. Unlike Student Lists, which save a static list of the same students, a Saved Search dynamically regenerates a list of students or users based on the search criteria. This feature can be especially helpful for users who frequently run the same search at different points in the term, as it allows you to maintain consistency with your search parameters.
Referrals
What is the “Issue a Referral” button used for?
Advisors can select the “Issue a Referral” button within Navigate to make a non-emergency referral to proactively connect undergraduate students to campus support services.
What happens when I make a referral for a student by clicking on “Issue a Referral?”
Click here to see an overview of the referral process in Navigate. Every referral automatically sends an email to the student with relevant information about the office to which they were referred. Additionally, some referrals open a case, which automatically notifies that office’s case manager.
Once the case manager is notified, that individual will reach out to the student to offer assistance. When the case manager closes the case, the advisor who initiated the referral will receive an email notification indicating the student has been taken care of.
Advising Indicator
What is the Advising Indicator?
Navigate NC State calculates an Advising Indicator for undergraduate, and bachelor degree-seeking students, indicating a predicted level of support (low, medium, or high) generated by EAB’s predictive model. This prediction offers insights into the degree of assistance a student may require on their journey toward graduation.