Movein application software by unisolution - a user review

movein is a university application and admissions software by QS unisolutions, a subdivision of QS group, headquartered in London. As of 2013, it is mostly used by German universities [1].

User review of movein v3.4

The software shows a copyright notice for the year 2009, yet in 2013, it seems to be the latest version. The software facilitates the application and selection process but it many areas it is still not intuitive and time-consuming to use.

• Overview of applicants - When you start the software as a user, you usually want to get a quick overview of the current applicants for a specific course. Ideally, this would be the first thing that you see. Alas, this is not the case. Instead, you first have to search for the right applicants using several drop down menus.
  • Faculty members should be presented with the list of current applicants for the coming semester as soon as they open up the database connection via a browser.

• Data export - After having gained a quick overview, users typically need to dig deeper. Exporting data to a spreadsheet is a great way to do this. Unfortunately, the data is not ordered in a very meaningful way. Names and identifiers are not followed by what is usually most important for the selection process like previous grades which are in column number 235!
  • The most important data should come early in the spreadsheet. This includes the final average grade of the previous degree, the place and name of the institution, the name of the previous course, and the email of the applicant.

• File download - Lastly, users often need to download the supporting material including certificates, CV, and the like from the database since they cannot currently be displayed within the software. movein offers no way to do this efficiently for a large number of applicants. Instead, users need to do this one by one by entering an applicants profile, clicking through 2 times, and finally downloading the file. A huge waste of time if you have dozens or even hundreds of applicants.
  • It should be possible to select all relevant applicants in a list and then download an archive with all files in one click.

• Entering decisions - Faculty members currently don't have enough rights to select multiple students and mark them for admission, waiting list, or rejection. Students have to be selected and switched one by one.
  • Since selection committees composed of faculty members make these decisions, they need to be able to toggle these fields in a less time-consuming manner.

All in all, the software helps but the claim of a "highly efficient software" is overstated and big efficiency gains could still be achieved if the above points were addressed.

Developer responsiveness

The German office has been slow to react to suggested changes in 2011/2012. Many small requests, like translation corrections, were flat-out ignored and only worked on after a reminder. Many requests were also redirected to the UK office from where we did not get a response.

After personnel changes in 2012/13 the German office has been more responsive, although many problems have still not been addressed.