Verba Collect Gets A Makeover

The rush whirlwind has passed, and adoptions season is in full swing! Verba’s here to help with a full update to Verba Collect, which enhances the instructor experience and increases the bookstore’s administrative flexibility. Here’s the update:

Adoptions collection is one of the primary interactions the bookstore has with the faculty community. We want this interaction to be painless for instructors, and we want the bookstore to get all the credit.

That’s why we’re introducing full bookstore branding and color-theming on all instructor-facing pages. Give us a color and a logo and Verba Collect will do all the rest.

We’ve also modernized (read: simplified) the instructor interface and inserted intelligent notifications to provide guidance and feedback throughout the adoptions process.

Altogether, we think this version of Collect is the easiest way yet for instructors to get your store their adoptions, and they’ll have you to thank for it.

Self-Assignment

Until now, Verba Collect has functioned best when a bookstore assigns an instructor (complete with name and contact information) for each section in the catalog. This week we’re introducing an optional complement to that approach called self-assignment.

Self-assignment allows any visitor to the adoptions website to create an account using a verified email address. Once they’re in the system, users can assign themselves to sections for which adoptions have not yet been submitted. From there, everything works as usual – they can compile course materials lists, submit them, and receive email notifications and confirmation about the status of their adoptions.

Existing users can also add themselves to courses and sections when this option is enabled. When combined with a decent database of instructor names and emails, self-assignment makes Verba Collect an even more powerful way to efficiently gather and manage adoptions from the faculty community. To learn more about the new self-assignment option in Verba Collect, check out our documentation Wiki.

System Emails Revamp

Verba Collect harnesses a series of automated emails to keep the adoptions process rolling. The new version of Collect comes with significant enhancements to these emails.

As an adoptions platform driven by email notifications, emails from Collect can pile up for certain users. This version of Collect gives store staff a lot more control over which user levels receive which classes of email. Now the store can decide which emails are important, reducing clutter, and keeping instructors focused.

The actual content of emails from Collect has also been restructured to include key information about what the user has to do. Here’s an example:

You are assigned to submit textbook adoptions for:
3 sections from 2 courses.

So far, you have submitted a textbook adoption for 2 sections.
The following 1 sections need a submission from you:
MATH 2510 – 10

Lastly, we’ve implemented a highly requested feature: adoption confirmation emails. Now, whenever the bookstore accepts an adoption, Verba Collect automatically notifies the instructor who submitted the adoption to let them know about it. The email contains a list of all accepted course materials, so there’s no confusion between store and instructor.

New Edition Alerts BETA

We’ve also implemented another widely requested feature in the form of new edition alerts. By connecting editions in our database, Verba Collect can now tell instructors (or bookstore staff) when a newer edition of a given book is available.

Clicking on the new edition alert takes the user to a list of one or more editions with more recent publication dates than the original edition. This feature should help Collect clients cut down on time spent chasing older editions.

And that’s not all…

These are just some of the larger improvements in the latest version of Verba Collect. Users will also appreciate a number of smaller features, like the ability to send test emails.

We’re looking forward to feedback from existing Collect customers. And for those of you who are looking for a more sophisticated, efficient adoptions process, it’s not too late for this go round! You know where to find us.