Improving the Discovery Process for Prospective Students

Client: As UCLA Extension celebrates its 100th anniversary, it stands as California’s oldest and largest continuing higher education institution, dedicated to supporting the professional growth and personal enrichment of alumni, professionals, and corporate clients across the U.S. and globally.

SSI–Xcelacore Collaboration: Xcelacore, a Chicago-based technology and digital marketing firm, partnered with SSI to deliver UCLA Extension’s technology initiatives. Together, the teams worked on a comprehensive search revamp project, evaluated the technology infrastructure, and proposed strategies for enterprise-scale data warehousing, a Service-Oriented Architecture (SOA) website, and an Enterprise Service Bus (ESB).

Search Revamp Project

Challenge: UCLA Extension’s website search, implemented in 2016 alongside the Destiny Information System, began to exhibit delays and limitations that hindered the user experience. To align with UCLA’s strategic initiatives, the search module needed an upgrade to deliver faster, more scalable, and reliable search capabilities.

Solution: The joint SSI-Xcelacore team conducted a thorough analysis of user expectations and business requirements to create a custom search solution. Using agile methodology, SSI collaborated with Xcelacore’s onshore team to address performance bottlenecks, transitioning the platform to Solr/Apache Lucene. The search solution incorporated the following features:

• Quick search functionality with an enhanced, user-friendly UI/UX
• Customized industry-specific search terms with auto-suggestions in the search box
• Advanced filters for searching by course title, description, course number, and instructor
• Spell-check and auto-correct suggestions via Solr
• Mobile-optimized results for enhanced accessibility on all devices

Result: The enhanced search engine significantly improved UCLA Extension’s course discovery process, enabling prospective students to find relevant courses faster and more accurately, contributing to UCLA Extension’s strategic goals of accessibility and user satisfaction.