Iowa State University: The first R1 institution to fully implement Workday Student

• Iowa State University transitioned from outdated legacy systems to Workday’s cloud-based Student suite to enhance student, faculty, and staff experiences, standardize processes, and modernize its technology infrastructure.
• The project followed a five-phase strategy — readiness, planning, architect and build, testing, and deployment — actively involving campus stakeholders to ensure minimal disruption and alignment with institutional goals.
• As the first tier-one research (R1) university to fully implement Workday Student, Iowa State achieved a generational improvement in the student experience, simplifying operations and setting a new standard for innovation and operational excellence in higher education.

Iowa State University, a leading R1 university, is home to over 30,000 students and over 7,000 faculty, staff, and administrative personnel. As part of a strategic effort to enhance its student-centered learning environment, Iowa State launched an ambitious initiative to replace its legacy student information systems (SIS) with Workday’s cloud-based Student product suite. Three core objectives guided the project:

• Enhance the experience for students, faculty, and staff
• Standardize institutional processes and policies
• Modernize technology by transitioning from highly customized, on-premise systems to a configurable, cloud-based system

Following the successful deployment of Workday Financial Management, Workday Human Capital Management, Workday Learning, and Workday Adaptive Planning, Iowa State set its sights on implementing the student and receivables software products, marking the final phase in migrating away from legacy mainframe applications.

The primary challenge involved modernizing outdated systems and digital gateways for all campus users, ensuring uninterrupted administrative and student services, and enhancing enrollment and student success outcomes during the transition.

The team used a structured five-step approach that actively involved students, faculty, and staff:

1. Readiness: Reviewed Iowa State’s goals to identify how Workday could best support them.
2. Planning: Defined scope, built the project team, and established a timeline and budget.
3. Architect and build: Designed and configured Workday to meet Iowa State’s requirements and best practices.
4. Testing: Validated the system and solutions through multiple iterations to ensure production readiness.
5. Deployment and continuous improvement: Synchronized the migration and deployment of new solutions with the academic calendar to minimize disruption when replacing the legacy system.

During the readiness phase, the team identified key elements of Iowa State’s unique student experience — such as the personalized admissions welcome video — as valuable assets. Rather than replacing them, the team developed integrated solutions that preserved and enhanced these components through backend process improvements. This was just one of many creative strategies applied throughout the implementation.

Iowa State is now leveraging Workday’s technology to transform the student experience across the entire lifecycle — from recruitment and admissions to financial aid and graduation. As the first R1 university to implement the full suite of Workday Student modules, Iowa State has established a benchmark for innovation and operational excellence in higher education. This successful implementation is a testament to the university’s commitment to continuous improvement and innovation in its administrative and student service processes. Iowa State's application environment was modernized through strong collaboration with Huron and Workday, enhancing user experiences and simplifying complex processes.

Advising, records, and curriculum

• Academic requirement transparency
• Easy-to-view academic history
• Streamlined academic exemption workflows
• Student-initiated major changes with automated routing
• Automated pre-requisite enforcement during registration
• Course enrollment projection data
• Improved onboarding for continuing students
• Central location for student and course information
• Waitlisting available during registration when course enrollment is full
• Real-time degree audits and instructor permission for section enrollment management in Workday
• Ability for students to be assigned multiple advisors
• Ability for students to create multi-year academic plans to map out their program of study in collaboration with their advisor and create saved schedules to prepare for registration
• Ability for students to collaborate with their advisors to create multi-year academic plans and build saved class schedules in preparation for registration
• Reserved course seating options for targeted student populations

Admissions

• Visibility into application action items
• Single system for both undergraduate and graduate admissions
• Concurrent graduate student admissions process
• Formalized double-degrees in graduate admissions applications
• Streamlined graduate evaluation and special application processing
• Enhanced onboarding for new students

Student financials and financial aid

• Automated course fee approval process
• Standardized tuition assessment process for interdepartmental graduate programs
• Improved transaction transparency and reporting capabilities for student and customer billing
• Automated financial aid packaging and nightly tuition processing using real-time academic data
• Transparent documentation requirements for students and parents
• More accurate academic progress tracking for aid eligibility
• Undeclared option available for first-year graduate students
• Estimated tuition awards for graduate assistants included in aid offers
• Centralized platform for managing student employment

Overall

• Mobile-friendly, secure, and modern user interfaces
• Workflow-enabled processes for efficiency and compliance