Forging Pathways to Student Success

As one of the nation's leading public research universities, Purdue University prepares students to solve complex challenges across engineering, science, business, health, and beyond. At its flagship campus in West Lafayette, Indiana, part of that mission is ensuring each of its over 40,000 undergraduate students can access the technology tools to thrive on their unique paths to graduation.

Purdue has long leveraged Ellucian's degree-auditing capabilities to give students and advisors a transparent view of degree progress. Today's students, though, rarely follow linear academic journeys. As student expectations evolved, leaders wanted to extend the self-service experience beyond understanding degree requirements to actively guiding students through course planning.

"We had a big initiative through the provost's office around transformative education," said Molly Gilbert, Director of Student Success Technologies at Purdue. "Our students were really asking for a responsive planner."

Building on its foundational degree-auditing system, Purdue adopted Ellucian's smart planning capability to help students translate degree requirements into personalized semester-by-semester plans. Embedded AI optimizes course sequences, evaluates the impact of different decisions, and recommends next steps based on degree requirements and course availability.

"We've had great adoption from students," Gilbert said. "They're excited to find out they have it, that they can get in and see all of their degree requirements and their prerequisite chains."

Making Informed Decisions

Before rolling out smart planning, students at Purdue relied on their advisors' expertise to understand how academic decisions might affect their graduation. Exploring different majors, adding a minor, or evaluating alternative pathways required manual scenario planning and multiple touchpoints.

Today, students can explore those possibilities on their own time. As they consider changes to their academic journey, AI updates their plans in real time, helping them visualize how each decision might affect their progress and graduation timeline.

"A student could go in at 2:00 in the morning and say, 'I'm thinking about adding an accounting minor,'" Gilbert said. "The advisor can come in the next morning, see that email, take five minutes to look at the plan, and immediately get back to the student. They can even go in, make changes to that plan, save it, and say, 'I made a couple adjustments, check it out.' It just makes that process so much faster."

Instead of beginning advising appointments by constructing schedules, students and advisors can now start with a shared understanding of the student's goals. Conversations focus less on administrative tasks and more on evaluating opportunities, discussing tradeoffs, and planning for long-term success.

"It brings that shared communication piece together because students and advisors are looking at the same thing," Gilbert said. "There are advisors who appreciate that students may come in with more questions than they ever had before, but they are informed questions because they have looked at their plan beforehand."

Navigating Curriculum Complexity

Purdue is also benefiting institutionally from increased transparency into degree pathways within its complex curriculum. Implementing smart planning helped the university uncover inconsistencies that had accumulated over time, such as expired courses that were still required for certain degree paths.

"One really great plus is that it illuminates how students navigate curriculum based on everything that's coded," Gilbert said. "We found out there were some programs and degree plans students couldn't actually navigate without manual manipulation from a human."

By actively resolving inconsistencies as they arise, Purdue is strengthening the integrity of academic data across the institution. And as trust in the technology extends, students and advisors will gain confidence that each AI-assisted plan accurately reflects a viable path to graduation.

"That will really be a time saver," Gilbert said. "Because advisors can say, 'If it's a valid plan and it looks like this, great. I don't have to be an expert in this major across campus, because the system knows what those nuances are.'"

Keeping Students Moving Forward

Looking ahead, Purdue is also adopting Ellucian's credential discovery capability to help ensure every student's achievements receive the recognition they deserve. AI will continuously evaluate completed coursework against available degrees, certificates, and other credentials, helping identify completed awards, near-completers, and additional opportunities that might otherwise go unnoticed.

"I see it helping to make sure students are getting the most they can while they are at Purdue," Gilbert said. "I don't want them to miss out on an extra minor or certificate just because nobody knew they were one course away."

Purdue's vision extends beyond implementing individual technologies. The university is building a connected student experience that provides consistent guidance, removes unnecessary complexity, and empowers students to navigate every stage of their academic journey confidently.

"I really do see Ellucian's degree planning tools helping students think through their degrees and how they are going to do all the things they want to do during their time here," Gilbert said. "Being able to do some of that on your own supports our higher education philosophy of helping students become critical-thinking, contributive members of society."