Ahlia University selects SunGard Higher Education to help create a unified digital campus

The solution, PowerCAMPUS Unified Digital Campus (UDC), will help Ahlia University achieve new benchmarks for quality assurance assessment in Bahrain by providing resources for teaching and learning.

Professor Abdulla Al-Hawaj, President, Ahlia University, said:

"As a fast-growing institution with ambitious goals, Ahlia University is always keen to benchmark its processes against regional and global best practices in higher education. We are seeking to dynamically embrace ways that will help us improve and sustain the best possible educational quality learning outcomes for our students. PowerCAMPUS UDC will help provide an environment that will move us closer to our vision of becoming a major centre of academic excellence."

SunGard Higher Education's PowerCAMPUS UDC helps small to mid-sized institutions, and the people they serve, find better ways to teach, learn, manage and connect. Institutions around the world are using the PowerCAMPUS UDC to help realize strategic goals for growth and improvement.

The PowerCAMPUS UDC helps institutions respond effectively to expectations around improved accountability, performance and productivity. By automating administrative tasks for recruitment, admissions, retention, financial services, academic records and human resources, as well as creating self-service capabilities for a collaborative community, the PowerCampus UDC helps institutions deliver on their learning and service obligations to students.

The PowerCAMPUS UDC is built on Microsoft technologies such as SharePoint and SQL-Server and integrated with other Microsoft applications such as Dynamics GP.

"Mobility and connectivity are important to today's students, they want to be connected to each other and their faculty without being in the same room; they want to know that the quality of their academic programs are recognized regionally and globally; likewise, college staff want to be able to offer quality administrative services with less time and physical presence," said Mathew Boice, general manager, EMEA, SunGard Higher Education.

"By selecting the PowerCAMPUS UDC, Ahlia University has taken a step toward creating a connected and mobile learning environment. We are pleased to be playing a role in supporting the University's progression toward regional leadership in quality standards and accreditation."

As part of its commitment to the development of Bahrain's higher education, Ahlia University teamed with SunGard Higher Education in February 2009 to organize the Bahrain Higher Education Executive Meeting.

The event attracted more than 75 academics, educators and top government officials from Bahrain Quality Assurance Authority (QAA) and Ministry of Higher Education. Quality reforms, accreditation and performance management, in Bahrain's higher education, were among the important topics discussed.