Moving Ellucian Colleague to SaaS does not change what institutions need from their systems. It changes how those needs are implemented. And integrations are one of the areas that inevitably need to be rethought when making that transition.
This project focuses on the AdvisorTrac integration for Colleague in an Ellucian SaaS environment. AdvisorTrac, a solution by Redrock Software, supports academic advising by relying on a steady flow of student profiles, enrollment data, and instructor context. That flow already existed before the move to SaaS. It was automated, scheduled, and well understood. What changed with SaaS was not the purpose of the integration, but the technical model behind it.
In an on-prem setup, integrations like this often relied on patterns that are simply not part of a SaaS platform. Direct database access is replaced by APIs. Local jobs give way to managed pipelines. The logic still matters, but it has to be reimplemented using SaaS-native tools that follow Ellucian’s cloud architecture.
In this project, our team at ABCloudz took an existing AdvisorTrac integration pattern and rebuilt it for Ellucian Colleague SaaS. We analyzed the established data flows, identified the underlying user stories, and reimplemented them using Ellucian Data Connect and Ethos APIs. The result is a reusable, SaaS-compatible integration that institutions can adopt to keep advising data consistent, secure, and fully aligned with Ellucian’s cloud standards.
We have applied the same modernization approach to other Ellucian Colleague SaaS integrations, including projects with Rave Alert, Ex Libris Alma, Maxient, T2 Systems, and other third-party platforms.
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The original integration pattern and the SaaS reset
Before SaaS, the AdvisorTrac integration followed a pattern that was simple, proven, and dependable. In the on-premises Colleague environment, the system provided the data, a scheduled process extracted student and enrollment records, CSV files were generated, and those files were delivered to AdvisorTrac through a secure transfer endpoint. It ran quietly in the background and did exactly what advising teams expected it to do.
That pattern worked because the on-prem environment allowed it. Data access was direct, extraction logic lived close to the source, and file delivery was easy to automate with local jobs.
Ellucian Colleague SaaS did not change the purpose of the integration. AdvisorTrac still needed the same student profiles, enrollment details, and instructor context, delivered on a predictable schedule and in a fixed format. What changed was the implementation model. Direct database access was no longer available, and local jobs were replaced by managed, API-driven automation.
This is where the reset happens. Not a correction of broken logic, but a shift in how that logic is expressed.
Rebuilding the integration for Colleague SaaS
Recreating this integration in SaaS was not about inventing something new. It was about translating proven advising logic into a model that fits Ellucian’s cloud architecture.
Starting from existing advising logic
We started by breaking down the existing integration into clear user stories. What data AdvisorTrac expects. How often it arrives. Which records belong together. What gets filtered, combined, or excluded. None of that logic was discarded. It was lifted from the on-prem pattern and reshaped for SaaS execution.
Orchestrating the integration with Data Connect pipelines
Ellucian Data Connect acts as the execution layer for the entire integration and is where the legacy advising logic is brought back to life in a SaaS-native form. Instead of relying on direct database access, the pipelines retrieve Colleague data through Ellucian Ethos APIs, which provide secure, authenticated access to student, enrollment, section, and instructor records exposed by the SaaS platform.
In this project, the integration is implemented as two coordinated Data Connect pipelines. One pipeline focuses on enrollment and section data, establishing the academic structure AdvisorTrac depends on. The second pipeline enriches that dataset with student and instructor details, completing the advising view required by the platform.
Both pipelines use Ethos APIs as their data source, apply the same business rules that existed in the on-prem setup, and perform validation and mapping before generating the CSV outputs AdvisorTrac expects. Scheduling, monitoring, error handling, and delivery are all handled inside Data Connect, without local jobs or direct database access.
This structure keeps the solution modular, easier to maintain, and reusable across institutions running Colleague SaaS.
Delivering stable outputs in a SaaS-native model
At the end of the flow, validated CSV files are delivered to AdvisorTrac through a configurable SFTP endpoint or a supported cloud storage target, such as Amazon S3. The format stays stable. The timing stays predictable. Only the execution model changes.
This is the future state architecture. The same integration outcome, rebuilt on SaaS-native foundations that align with Ellucian’s cloud standards and can be reused by any institution running Colleague SaaS.
Results
The advising integration is no longer dependent on undocumented scripts, environment-specific behavior, or individual system knowledge. The logic that feeds AdvisorTrac is now fully defined, repeatable, and portable within Ellucian’s SaaS platform.
As a result, institutions are no longer solving the same integration problem once. They now have a SaaS-aligned pattern that can survive platform updates, staffing changes, and future advising requirements without being rebuilt again.
Modernize your Ellucian integrations with ABCloudz
At ABCloudz, we help institutions carry their existing integration logic forward into SaaS without dragging along on-prem assumptions. This project reflects our integration modernization offering for Ellucian SaaS in practice. We work with Ethos APIs, Data Connect pipelines, and Ellucian-supported patterns to build integrations that are secure, explicit, and designed to evolve as SaaS platforms change.
If you are preparing to migrate to Ellucian SaaS or reviewing integrations that were originally built for on-prem environments, we can help you assess what needs to be reimplemented and how to do it the right way the first time. Let’s talk about how to modernize your integrations for SaaS and keep them working long after the migration is complete.
