After more than a year of studying the problem, they concluded that an imaging system was the way to go, and were exploring the idea of purchasing their own system. However, because many offices on campus might also benefit from the technology, it was ultimately decided to build a more generic campus-wide system that other offices could plug into. The result is ODIN, which was designed by a team from Computing and Communications, the Student Loans Office and the Receivables Collection Office and piloted by the Student Loans Office. There, student's files are scanned and identifying information is entered into a database. Once the files are on the system, they can be accessed on any PC via a Web browser.
Documents appear as images, so they look exactly as they do on paper.
A password is required so that unauthorized people cannot look at confidential documents. The system, which went on line in 1996, has saved countless hours of staff time previously needed to go to a file room to get and return files and has eliminated the problem of two people needing the same file at once. Also, since the paper loan files for 19,000 borrowers have been shredded, space has been freed to improve the service area for student loan borrowers. The UW's project was chosen from among 79 entries.