Customer story · St. John's University
From the Wild West to a well-oiled machine with Argos
Moving to Ellucian Banner SaaS ended St. John’s Access and Brio reporting. With Argos and Evisions Professional Services, the university rebuilt on 100+ DataBlocks and 1,200+ reports, and automated award letters that once took days and weekends.
Queens, New York
Private four-year and graduate university
Argos
- Award letters, automatedDays of manual work and weekend shifts replaced by an automated process.
- 100+ DataBlocks, 1,200+ reportsPlus multiple OLAP cubes, actively tracked to support cross-functional reporting.
- Real-time data, on demandInteractive dashboards let users explore data and adjust views on the fly.
St. John's University at a glance
1870
Founded
~19,691
Students
~1,410
Faculty and staff
100+
Undergraduate programs
18+
Graduate programs
01
The challenge
A hoarder’s closet of reports
Before implementing Argos, St. John’s University faced a complex and fragmented reporting landscape. Over the years, reporting had become decentralized, inconsistent, and highly reliant on outdated tools, most notably Microsoft Access and Oracle Hyperion/Brio.
With no centralized standards, reporting varied widely across departments, often leading to conflicting results, questionable data integrity, and significant security concerns.
“Before Argos, it was a hoarder’s closet and probably your worst nightmare. The reporting landscape in Microsoft Access and Oracle Hyperion/Brio had become the Wild West.”
Maura Woods · Associate Vice President of Information Technology
No central standards
Reporting varied across departments, with conflicting results.
Integrity and security in doubt
Siloed reports raised questions about data integrity and security.
Tools with no future
Access and Hyperion/Brio were no longer viable with Banner SaaS.
The university had attempted to modernize with other systems, but adoption was minimal, and reporting remained siloed and difficult to scale. Leadership felt pressure to establish stronger data governance as institutional priorities shifted toward evidence-based decision-making and compliance demands increased.
The tipping point came with the transition to Ellucian Banner SaaS. Microsoft Access and Oracle Hyperion/Brio were no longer viable with the new architecture, and the existing approach couldn’t support the growing need for secure, reliable, and accessible data across departments.
02
The solution
Clean out the closet, then build it right
Recognizing the opportunity, St. John’s strategically included Evisions Argos in its SaaS contract. Although it had never used Argos before, the university was drawn to its proven success across higher education and its reputation for ease of use, data security, and institutional fit.
The university also partnered closely with Evisions Professional Services to build core DataBlocks and guide a structured rollout.
“We needed something reliable, something we knew other schools had success with. Argos gave us that confidence from day one.”
Maura Woods · Associate Vice President of Information Technology
The implementation was methodical and intentional. Training began in May 2023, followed by a year-long process of meeting with business units to assess reporting needs, reduce redundancy, and define business requirements. Departments were encouraged to “clean out the closet”: a full inventory of legacy reports surfaced thousands with inaccurate tables, fields, and logic. The focus shifted to consistent, validated views of institutional data.
A robust security model was built using Banner roles integrated with Okta, so users only see the data relevant to their function. Argos folders were mapped accordingly (student, finance, HR), giving users clarity and confidence while central teams maintain control over access and definitions.
Award letters, rebuilt
Among the most impactful changes was the financial aid award letter process, which previously required two teams, several days, and even weekend work. The new approach bypasses the legacy letter generation entirely: data is pulled directly from Ellucian Insights into Argos, formatted as multi-page PDFs, and automatically stored in BDM (Banner Document Management). Revised letters are version-controlled and shared through Slate, giving students and families real-time access.
“They used to print everything out of Access, and then the letters were just gone. Now they’re stored, retrievable, and even available to students in Slate before they’ve deposited.”
Maura Woods · Associate Vice President of Information Technology
| Before | With Argos |
|---|---|
| Reports scattered across Access and Oracle Hyperion/Brio | Core Argos DataBlocks built with Evisions Professional Services |
| Thousands of reports with inaccurate tables, fields, and logic | Consistent, validated views of institutional data |
| Award letters printed from Access, then gone | Multi-page PDFs stored in BDM and shared through Slate |
| Two teams, several days, and weekend work | Letters generated automatically from Ellucian Insights |
“
Sharing an OLAP cube with one of our college deans was incredibly rewarding, especially when they remarked, ‘I’ve been waiting for a tool like this for years.’ We were able to demonstrate interactively year over year program trends by various dimensions with the click of the mouse.
Jacqueline Clemente-Papadopoulos · Director Business Transformation & Customer Success, St. John's University
03
The results
Fewer reports. The right ones.
St. John’s University has seen meaningful transformation across both operations and culture.
No more weekend award runs
Award letter automation eliminated multi-day manual processes and weekend work.
100+ DataBlocks, 1,200 reports
Plus several OLAP cubes, actively tracked for cross-functional needs.
Explore, don’t request
Dashboards, parameters, and OLAP cubes let users adjust views on the fly.
Teams own their reporting
Functional teams own their reporting strategy and schedules.
Access governed by role
Security and governance improved through role-based access via Argos and Okta.
Documents in students’ hands sooner
Earlier and easier access to key financial documents.
Reporting and definitions have been standardized, reducing confusion and conflicting outputs, and users are increasingly empowered to explore data with ad hoc visualizations for a richer, more detailed understanding.
“
We’ve done a phenomenal amount of work when you sit back and look at what’s been inventoried. And now that people are trained and engaged, they’re finally saying, ‘We don’t need everything, we just need the right things.’
Maura Woods
Associate Vice President of Information Technology
Watch the story
Inside St. John’s transformation with Evisions Professional Services
St. John's University in their own words, a few minutes long.
04
The future
From transactional reporting to strategy
While much of the early work has focused on rebuilding foundational reports, leadership at St. John’s is excited about what comes next. With Argos in place, the university is not only modernizing systems; it is redefining its data culture.
Departments are beginning to explore the next phase of reporting, moving from transactional to strategic. Dashboards for enrollment trends, retention, and other forward-looking analytics are on the horizon. The transformation continues, driven by empowered users, reliable tools, and a strategic partner committed to their success.
More customer stories
What other institutions changed
The Citadel
ROTC invoicing for 400+ award recipients, hands-free
Financial Aid broke ROTC invoicing into layers in Argos, turning a manual process for more than 400 award recipients into a consistent, automated one.
ArgosFinancial AidFinance
Stetson University
From debating the numbers to deciding with them
Staff had relied on Excel shadow systems and spent more time arguing over which number was right than deciding what to do. Reporting now runs from one reliable source, and academic standing notices go out automatically.
ArgosInstitutional ResearchRegistrar
Fashion Institute of Technology
Admissions letters in minutes, not hours
One-click automation replaced manual letter generation, which now takes under 10 minutes. Data accuracy reached 99 percent and report verification time fell by up to 90 percent.
ArgosAdmissionsInstitutional Research
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