Make evaluating applications easier
Currently our board members/application evaluators are having to have two screens open or flip between screens when reviewing each application.
One screen has the app and other the evaluation form. Isn't there a way to make this easier for them?
Idea posted June 6, 2011 by Angie Boecker, Central Minnesota Arts Board
Moved to Archive during a clean up effort in April 2024.
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Emily Bronson commented
A batch "Print Packet" function would be useful in the interim....until a better review process can be implemented.
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Mary Giraulo commented
Lynn's suggestion (brilliant) makes a fourth option - adding application questions in-line into the evaluation. That would work better for us than option #2, since it allows you to be selective about which parts of the application are used in the evaluation. About half of our application is just for staff verification.
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Lynn Larson commented
Chris,
I like the idea (#2) of having the evaluation include application questions within it in-line as you said. This way they are evaluating particular questions that have been chosen by the administrator. End result being that the evaluator would not have to toggle back and forth between LOI or Application and the evaluation.
It would be nice if we could not only have report field questions show on the evaluation but the form questions as well.
Thanks!
Lynn Larson
Fred & Jean Allegretti Foundation
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Chris Dahl commented
Hi all,
I realized I'm late to this discussion, but this is something that has is represented in a number of Idea Lab items, has been discussed at some length here, has been discussed by us internally, and was a focus of our 2013 user conference. We definitely want to improve the review experience in 2014, and to do this, we need to keep getting at ideas that will benefit the majority of our users.What I've seen here comes down to:
1. creating a PDF of the form that is being reviewed so reviewers can see that while reviewing
2. adding evaluation questions in-line on the application as an optional feature
3. having the evaluation and application show up side-by-sideIf I'm missing something, please let me know. Also, please consider more details around each. Both options #1 and #3 call into play screen restrictions, especially as more reviewers / board members have adopted iPads for accessing the web.
And if anyone has some really concrete examples - either something you can screenshot / mock up, or some examples from another application - those would go a long way to helping us make this a more actionable item.
Thanks in advance for your feedback,
-chris -
Ideas commented
I agree with Angie - I'd like to see options on the evaluation form allowing us to add evaluation questions in between application questions... maybe this could be set up like the "Add Comment" feature in the initial review?
If not all your clients want this - then please (pretty please) consider making it an optional feature. I have been searching for a scrolling review option for years. Multiple tabs/windows are not user-friendly for most people. And it's certainly not user-friendly on mobile or tablet.
I also agree that the entire question/instructions should be visible to reviewers.
posted August 1, 2013 by Mary Giraulo, United Arts of Central Florida
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Ideas commented
Hi all,
Great idea! Our board members would prefer to scroll down than to go back and forth between application and evaluation.
Rossana
posted June 28, 2011 by Rossana Martinez, Lily Auchincloss Foundation
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Ideas commented
We have large Fellowship applications that are being reviewed with supplemental documents (transcripts, letters of recommendation, etc). Using the print packet I end up creating a PDF for each application and posting them in DropBox for our evaluators. Evaluators then have access through the pdf to the complete application including supplemental documents while only dealing with the evaluation form online.
Don
posted June 28, 2011 by Don Brackett, Robert and Patricia Switzer Foundation
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Ideas commented
Ron,
This sounds like a possible issue on our end. I don't believe we intended what you describe. I'll contact you off-line about this and update here as appropriate. Thank you!
-raymond
posted June 23, 2011 by Raymond Burket, Foundant Technologies
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Ideas commented
Either one of the two options would be fine for us.
I also had a second point regarding the volunteers' evaluation. I've talked with Betty a little about this, but I figured I'd explore this here. Our volunteers don't see the same view of the application as the applicant. Each question is truncated because of space limitation, and there is a place to be descriptive. The applicant sees both, our volunteer reviewers only see the truncated question, unless they do a Print Packet.
Additionally, the group headings don't appear in either view. I can appreciate the need to be concise, but this makes it a challenge for some of our volunteers.
posted June 23, 2011 by Ron Katz, United Way of Asheville and Buncombe County
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Ideas commented
Ron,
Good documentation suggestion and thank you. I haven't examined our reviewer tutorial in quite awhile and it is probably time we updated and enhanced the content. There are a few approaches:
Any preferences as to whether we should document a "2 browser window side-by-side" approach or the "One browser with two tabs" approach? There is another method using the PDF generated by the print packet and the browser for the evaluation portion.
Angie,
I'd love to chat about it more when the time comes. Thank you for the kind offer.
posted July 5, 2011 by Raymond Burket, Foundant Technologies
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Ideas commented
I know folks use different browsers, but we have encouraged our applicants as well as volunteers reviewing applications to use Mozilla Firefox. For the sake of our volunteers who are not as computer-literate as we'd like, it would be helpful for us is to have a quick tutorial on how to open two or more screens using this browser.
posted June 16, 2011 by Ron Katz, United Way of Asheville and Buncombe County
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Ideas commented
Raymond -- For me and you flipping back and forth between windows is easy but for others such as a few of our Board Members and people on the evaluation panels it isn't that easy and they end up closing out of something they didn't mean to or they end up with a lot of windows open and can't find what they need to do. Our Media Specialist has talk with people about opening two windows and having the up side by side while they are evaluating but that seems to a challenge too.
Print packets would be an answer but they would take away from the paperless aspect as you said in an earlier post. Not everyone has a Kindle or IPod and we can supply them.
If we can't have app questions within the evalution form, I think a two scrollable frames on one screen might be the answer. With that maybe a "next" button at the bottom so they don't have go out and come back in they can just click next and then the next app and next evaluation form would come up. (Of course giving them the option to go back to a list of applications too.)
I would be happy to talk with you about this some more if you like.
posted June 13, 2011 by Angie Boecker, Central Minnesota Arts Board
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Ideas commented
The idea of evaluation questions keyed into certain areas of the application is a good one and would work for some clients, but we can't count on that for all clients. Some evaluation questions don't key in to a specific area of an application and/or some clients don't design their evaluations in that fashion. Unfortuantely it's not a design pattern we can count on...
In terms of having the evaluation and application together on one page, my concern was that it would potentially involve a lot of scrolling. I had thought perhaps it would be easer to flick back and forth between windows rather than scroll. I suppose one idea might be a single window with two scrollable frames, one for the evaluation and one for the application/print packet. Folks with larger and high resolution screens could likely do that, but we have many folks who are still on 800x600 or 1024x768 and those resolutions don't lend themselves to a side-by-side scenario. Angie, I'd like to take this offline and give you a call to chat more about this and post the results of our conversation here for others to peruse and comment on. I would love for us to have some strategies around making evaluations easier and you sound like you've got some great ideas. Thank you!
posted June 10, 2011 by Raymond Burket, Foundant Technologies
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Ideas commented
Right now we can assign specific report fields from the process manager to appear on the evaluation page. It would be nice if somehow the entire application could be on the same page with the evaluation questions. Or if evaluation questions could be placed within the application and then when the evalutors have completed their evaluations they would click at the bottom of the page something like "submit evaluation". After they do that their scores are total and averaged like they are now and a report could be generated on their evaluation responses like we can do now.
Also as a side note...it would be easier for our evaluators if they could see the entire question/instructions that the applicant sees. That way they could see what the applicant was asked and if the applicant addressed the question.
posted June 9, 2011 by Angie Boecker, Central Minnesota Arts Board
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Ideas commented
This is a challenging one for us. While the desktop metaphor for computers works in some cases, there are other situations where it can get a bit strained. Certainly most folks do not have the same amount of real estate on their computer desktop as they do on their physical desktop. If one has dual-monitors, it is not too bad. Another approach is that of printing the grant requests and using the PC for evaluation, but then that tends to move away from paperless (which is something we like to encourage). An attractive alernative that has also been voiced is using e-readers (Kindle or Nook) or tablets (iPad, Xoom) as an alternative to printing requests. This can also be very handy in board/decision meeting situations so that everyone has access to all the requests without printing reams of paper.
Thank you for starting this thread Angie and please pass on any specific ideas around improving this that you might have. I would love to hear folks weigh in with ideas and input! The more the merrier. I'll keep this in my thoughts for awhile to see if any other ideas come to mind.
posted June 10, 2011 by Raymond Burket, Foundant Technologies