GRACELAND UNIVERSITY
The back-end technology does not differentiate one institution from another in ways that matter to prospective students. Universities compete on mission, culture and academic programmes – not on whether their financial aid system uses a different database structure.
The collective extends to implementation. All HESS members work with Drivestream, which focuses on Oracle deployments. When one institution hits a problem, the others learn from it. Collaborative meetings bring together HESS members and Drivestream consultants to discuss challenges that affect multiple institutions simultaneously.
If a university in the Midwest encounters an integration issue with employment records, a school on the East Coast can avoid the same problem before it starts implementation of that module.
Talia receives more from these meetings than she contributes, by her own assessment.“ I’ ve said many times the HESS Collective has provided me more insight than I’ ve provided them,” she says.“ I go to meetings and share information and content, but I’ ve received twice as much as I’ m ever able to give.”
The selection process took months, with the ERP assessment analysing vendors and narrowing options to three finalists.
176 March 2026