Change Builders – Access, simplified: Delivering degree certificates to students at speed

Meet the UCL Change Builders helping to drive progress for our community of staff, students and partners.

A banner for the UCL Change Builders article on degree certificates, with a member of the team on the right and the title of the article in black writing against a white background on the left

10 October 2024

Introducing UCL Change Builders

As part of our shared efforts to deliver on our Strategic Plan and respond to insights raised, teams across UCL have been working hard to drive progress for our expansive community.

It's often the combined efforts of many small steps of improvement, which build together to create immense impact, that make up much of our progress.

Recognising and celebrating the teams behind these efforts, UCL Change Builders spotlights these stories of change.

Know a Change Builder? Get in touch!

Cutting degree certificate delivery down from four months to two weeks

By launching an on-demand digital certificate portal, the team behind the digital degree certificate project enabled over 10,000 students to access their degree certificates within two weeks of graduating – down from a previous time of four months.

The project, which was launched in late 2023, works to help graduates to secure jobs and move forward in their careers more quickly. Read on to find out how they did it.

Recognising an opportunity for positive change

“Congratulations! You’ve received your offer for an exciting new role – we just need your UCL degree certificate to confirm your appointment.”

For the +10,000 students who graduate from UCL every year, obtaining a copy of their certificate could mean the difference between getting the job or missing out.

For many students then, timely delivery of these certificates is crucial.

“We print our certificates and send them across the world – and our communities are incredibly global”, explains Kirsten Hamilton, Head of Student Records at UCL.

The team came to recognise however that the time it takes to process, print and send certificates overseas was too long for some international students, who often relied on the physical copies to confirm job offers and go through national authority verification processes.

Pictured: Sharon Young (left), Charlotte Robinson (centre) and Tingyan Wange (right).

“Students would receive job offers but had to wait to secure them until their certificate arrived;” remembers Tingyan Wang, Liaison and Recruitment Officer for Chinese Social Media. “It was a real issue”.

Committed to acting upon feedback received, they established a focus group to begin working on a solution.

The road to accessing on-demand certificates

Work on the project started in summer 2023; in partnership with software provider Gradintel, a team of colleagues from across UCL came together to develop a new portal enabling students to obtain a valid digital copy of their certificate on-demand.

The journey to a finished product wasn’t quite straightforward, however.

The team was confronted with numerous questions to address: how quickly could the technology be integrated into UCL systems? How could it incorporate Chinese verification needs? And how could it be built to uphold UCL’s security standards and reputation?

“It felt like a big mountain to climb.”, remembers Kirsten.

Pictured: Student Lifecycle Manager Sharon Young.

Building a solution to a high standard demanded significant testing and, most importantly of all, teamwork – all in a compressed time frame.

“The [challenge] was making sure we covered all possible scenarios of certificate data output”, shares Student Lifecycle Manager Sharon Young.

“We worked closely with the Research Degrees team to make sure we had a comprehensive test sheet with pretty much every qualification UCL offers” adds Student Lifecycle Manager Charlotte Robinson. "It was an amazing team effort really”.

Feedback-led product development

After months of hard work – and a staunch defence of delivering a high-quality product over a quick fix – the digital certificates portal was ready for launch. Students were granted access in December 2023.

“My digital degree certificate facilitated me to showcase my credentials in job applications and professional networking” reflects Translation and Culture MA student Ganlin Chen. “Accessing it through a secure website [also] made me feel safe!”.

Students’ high engagement with the tool reflects how much it was needed.

Tingyan Wang, Liaison and Recruitment Officer for Chinese Social Media.

“10,000 students got their digital certificate at once” recalls Kirsten. “Within a day, around 60% had viewed it.”

One of those students is English Linguistics MA student Xinyue Guo.

“As an overseas student, thanks to the e-degree certificate, I can progress my job-hunting in China in time after graduation”, Xinyue reflects.

“It came out of a demand from a particular cohort of students, but it's massively impacted the entire student experience with something we had never previously conceptualised.” notes Charlotte.

“[Students] now have their digital award certificate within two weeks of their results being released, which wasn't something we ever really conceptualised”.

What’s next for the team?

The success of the project has been inspiring the team to brainstorm the development of additional self-service, easy-access products for students.

Pictured: Student Lifecycle Manager Charlotte Robinson.

"We want to want to make it easier for students to have more of what they need in one place”, shares Kirsten “that’s what we’re exploring at the moment”.

With a passion for delivering further improvements to the student experiences, the team is striving for continued success with future projects.