United Nations Public Service Awards Case Studies

Admission to public universities and institutions in Egypt operates through a centralized office, University Enrollment Co-ordination Office. This office enrolls over 450,000 students into these universities and institutions each year.

The public service tackled here is the application process for desired universities/institutes. Application takes place after students receive their secondary school certificates’ scores (either from Egypt or abroad), on which admission precedence depends (with students having the highest scores getting first choice on the universities they will be joining).

This application process took place in 19 offices distributed all over Egypt in order to try to cover all regions in Egypt. This process is further complicated by the ever-increasing number of students eligible to join universities each year, as well as the unequal demand for given faculties in universities.

Traditionally, each year, following the announcement of the Egyptian General Secondary Certificate results, both students and their parents flooded the university enrollment offices, stood in long lines waiting for their turn to buy the paper application forms (costing EGP40 per application). The application is both discipline-based and university-based. Students are asked to fill the admissions application by listing their choices of their desired discipline and university in a descending order of preference. The forms were filled manually by posting a stamp for each choice, the total number of choices that each student had to fill being 48. The applications are then submitted back to the university enrollment offices.

Therefore, the process requires at least two visits to apply for university enrollment. Also, once the office receives the student form there is no way to change its contents even if the form includes mistakes which reduces the student’s chance to have a suitable position in the university. Another component that may be added to the student's grade is the sports incentive that was submitted by the student manually.

All student applications ultimately end up at a center in which all data from each and every student application form is entered by seasonal data entry personnel (making room for many data entry errors, affecting the institute the students ends up in), into the back-end legacy system where the matching process is carried out.

Once the enrollment phase results were declared, students are notified of their results by post mail. Each student has to join his/her university and transfer between similar institutes (based on availability) can be made only on the next academic year. This limitation in the manual system adds on new burdens to the student, his family and the government (accommodation, extra expenses, hostel establishment, and transportation cost)

Furthermore, the whole process of university enrollment had to be carried out within a limited time frame between the time of declaring the results and scores and before the academic year started. A mature solution was required to serve students in a better way, reduce costs, and solve all reported problems.

What is the initiative about? (the solution)
The initiative taken was replacing the paper process by a comprehensive web-based application that accepts student university enrollment applications, and is supported by a 24/7 call center for student support. Hence, availing the enrollment application service virtually anywhere internet is available. Students were able to access the application with their student IDs and a special PIN code that they received along with their secondary school certificates. The online application was offered entirely free of charge, against the EGP 40 students paid for the paper application and manuals. Given that over 450,000 students applied for university enrollment annually, this alone resulted in savings of over EGP 18,000,000 for the public. The application provides the students with guide lines, rules and interactive online help together with the ability to update personal data. These guidelines are built in the application form itself, and it prevents the student from including illegal choices. This means that only error-free forms are submitted. Also, all other incentives are added automatically to the student's grades. Another benefit of the online application is that students now have the chance to alter their choices after submitting them, as long as it is in the timeframe. The transition to the online application was supported by exponentially expanding the e-Government call center hotline (19GOV), to help students with the online application: helping students to fill their forms or correct their personal data. It is also used as a tool that communicates citizen reactions to the service, which has been enormously successful. Enrollment results are communicated to the students not only through mail but also, through SMS and the web based application. Recent estimates have placed savings by the online process at EGP 40,000,000 for the public representing transportation and accommodation costs. Other huge savings resulted as well for the operational costs of the government, such as savings in paper forms, and seasonal staffing of university enrollment offices and data entry personnel. For the Government, applying online proved to be highly reliable: •Elimination of the data entry clerk, and probably mistakes. •Using PIN code, each student final result could not be mixed up with someone else’s. •Greater efficiency for the government For both citizens and Government: •Transactions would be a lot faster and with a remarkable reduction in clerical errors; hence offering a much better service, at no cost. •Improving image of the government and the building of trust in the e-Government services.

Who proposed the solution, who implemented it and who were the stakeholders?
Initiative was led by the Ministry of State for Administrative Development, as the organization responsible for the e-Government program in Egypt, in early 2003. Meanwhile the university enrollment process is owned by the University Enrollment Co-ordination Office (part of the Ministry of Higher Education). The Ministry of State for Administrative Development played a crucial role in this initiative as the project coordinator and technical consultant to the Ministry of Higher Education. With many different stakeholders such as the developers, testers, UEC office, Ministry of Education, call center, as well as hundreds of thousands of students/users, this role was of upmost importance. The service was also dependent on the Ministry of Education which would feed the students’ records (including personal information and results) to the UEC office. The Ministry of Education also delivered student PIN codes & results at its schools. The online application was implemented and hosted on the Egyptian Government Portal (www.egypt.gov.eg). The Portal’s operation team (part of the Ministry of State for Administrative Development) was responsible for service operation, security and technical support. Different public-private partnerships (PPP) were utilized to finance printing and distributing PIN codes to eligible students over the past 2 years, in order to cut government expenses. Those were usually telecom operators with big marketing budgets. Private companies are competing annually to secure sponsorship of the application, which is a further witness to its success.

Describe how and when the initiative was implemented by answering these questions
a. What were the strategies used to implement the initiative? In no more than 500 words, provide a summary of the main objectives and strategies of the initiative, how they were established and by whom.
Initiative’s main objectives were to reduce costs for both the public (students/parents) and the government (paperwork, staffing, etc…). The strategies used were: enhance the service and offer it through a more convenient channel (students would not have to travel to UEC offices anymore), second separate service provider from the public, third, use ICT for interactive communication between the government and the citizen. That is, develop a flexible and scalable system design which makes it suitable for future consolidation and aggregation, as well as utilizing the use of available resources and upgrading the infrastructure to satisfy the citizen requirements to enjoy an easy, interactive, nonstop service. Its final objective was to provide a continuous auditing system supported by the government’s CRM and the service reporting systems. The objectives were formulated by the following: •Government Services Program Director, Ministry of State for Administrative Development •Government Resources Management Program Director, Ministry of State for Administrative Development Among the strategies employed in this initiative was opting not to go for a big-bang approach, and sticking to a ramp-up strategy. The initiative was first introduced in 2004 and attracted a mere 3,500 students, which reached 21,000 students in 2006. In those years it ran in parallel to the paper system. Students had the choice to register through UEC offices or online. After having 3 consecutive years with no major issues (not a single error in data, processing or performance) in the system, it was clear that it was ready for full-launch. In 2007, it UEC offices no longer offered university enrollment application services. Students had to go online to register their choices. Another strategy was that of contingency: a disaster recovery site was set up for the web-based application, should anything go wrong, as it would become a high-value target with more than 450,000 users. Internet connections to the application were secured from 4 different service providers and different central offices as well. Severe security measures were also taken.

b. What were the key development and implementation steps and the chronology? No more than 500 words
The Ministry of State for Administrative Development investigated the universities enrollment application work flow, on its quest to identify public services that can be introduced through its e-Government initiative. This work flow was analyzed and optimized in the next few years. MSAD secured approval from the Ministry of Higher Education in 2003 to introduce the web-based application channel to apply for university enrollment. The first edition of the application was developed by the Faculty of Engineering at Cairo University in 2003/2004 to make the 2004 university enrollment season. It was launched on the e-Government Portal in 2004. It ran in parallel to the paper application starting 2004 and ending 2006. Decision was taken in late 2006 to abandon the paper application at UEC offices and to go for the web-based application only for the 2007 season of university enrollment. High measures were taken in anticipation of the huge number of users for the system in 2007. More than 600 computer labs all over Egypt were made available to eligible students to use for university enrollment application for free. Well-trained specialists were available in each lab for nine hours a day to assist students/parents in filling the applications, through all 3 university enrollment phases. 19GOV call center was operating around the clock as well to support students/parents. Training sessions are held annually for CRM (call center/e-mail/fax) agents and support team, as well as lab specialists, in MSAD. Log files from 2007 were analyzed after all 3 phases were completed and not a single application error was found. In 2008, an updated version of the application was launched. This one supported all secondary school certificates (both local and international) – international students had to submit their applications through UEC offices in 2007.

c. What were the main obstacles encountered? How were they overcome? No more than 500 words
One of the main obstacles faced was the resistance to change from the Ministry of Higher Education’s civil servants that worked at UEC offices. But once the employees recognized how valuable automation can be for them, they became supportive rather than being resistive. They were also persuades to promote change by providing different incentives and preparing employees to become good users and good change agents. Awareness sessions and workshops were held along with the required training to the different managerial levels (to guarantee their support) and employees (for support and implementation). In the period 2004-2006, the major challenge was how to get the students to apply online. Oddly enough it was not a technological barrier as an enormous number of students logged on to view their results. In a society greatly wary of dealing with the government, particularly in such a life-altering matter, most students and their parents were reluctant to try something so unfamiliar to them. The barrier was cultural, the students and/or their parents did not trust the government enough to carry out such a feat. This barrier could only be overcome by increasing the public awareness of the application through increased TV, radio and newspaper ads. The government went as far as offering prizes to students who used the service. PIN codes were delivered to students by mail in the web-based application’s early years. This lead to a many Pins being lost/undelivered with students not being able to access the application (only 35% were actually delivered with some even opened). Starting 2007, the Ministry of State for Administrative Development succeeded in persuading the Ministry of Education to attach the student PIN codes to their success certificates which was a key success factor for the project. Problems related to infrastructure limitations were faced when project started in 2004. This resulted in some deficiency in the service while availing different phases’ results when huge number of students and their families try to access the application in a very limited period of time (more than 120.000 users in less than three hours). In 2007, university enrollment results were sent to students in SMS’s at the same time with deploying it on the service server and providing the same data through the main internet service providers (ISP’s) in Egypt at the same time which solved this problem completely. The rules for university enrollment were set by the Universities’ High Council ahead of university enrollment season. However, these rules kept changing during runs of the university enrollment web-based application in order to save further costs for the government. These changes had to be reflected in the online application in a very limited time and without proper testing had to be re-deployed on the e-Government Portal. The answer to this was well-designed applications that were implemented to allow rule modifications and successfully sustained for the last years where 86 deployments were done in 2008 season. Operational costs for the project on MSAD’s side were too high for it to sustain with its limited budget. A public-private partnership was secured with private sponsors in both 2007 and 2008 to finance the whole initiative.

d. What resources were used for the initiative and what were its key benefits? In no more than 500 words, specify what were the financial, technical and human resources’ costs associated with this initiative. Describe how resources were mobilized
The project budget was initially part of the national budget (from 2004 up to 2006) then the private sector covered all running costs for the succeeding two years and expected to continue sponsoring the project against some advertisements for its products by means of simple inserts with the student pin number and inclusion of its logos in media advertisements. The project’s initial investment was less than EGP 2,000,000 invested in the reuse of the existing infrastructure, e-Government portal and gateways upgrades to suit the service critical operational/security requirements. Since then, the annual running cost is about EGP 2,000,000 (about US$ 400,000) including application maintenance and upgrading, PIN code production and delivery, application functional/security/burn-in (exhaustive) testing, and advertising. However this annual cost does not represent any burden on the government; instead Private companies are competing annually to secure sponsorship of the application. MSAD covers all operation team salaries, portal costs and any costs arising due to sudden unplanned cases that may happen while normal operations proceed. MSAD also provides all the hardware available at its portal, which is mostly used up by university enrollment in its season to the application. Most importantly, MSAD oversees the execution of the whole project, as this is MSAD’s fundamental strength.

Is the initiative sustainable and transferable?
The universities enrollment web-based application is now the only channel to apply to public universities for Egyptian General Secondary Certificate holders in Egypt. It actually started a paradigm shift, making students realize how they can benefit from technology in their day-to-day life and they are actually demanding more automation and less paperwork from the government. Currently decision makers are stressing the fact that the application must be extended to cover all secondary-level certificates to enable all students to benefit from it. This should be achieved within 2 years according to plan. 2008 marks the first year for Azhari students to be able to use the application as well as foreign certificate holders. Through its public-private partnership model, the project is self-sustainable with no need for additional fund from the national budget, and might even be a source of national revenue one day, if companies continue to compete fiercely to win the sponsorship. The e-Government Portal is being constantly being upgraded and improved, as well as its security measures, which all lead up to a better service level being offered, increases its credibility and the end user’s satisfaction. The service’s wide success prompted other government organization in Egypt to request the same service for their graduates or employees such the “Doctors Charging Service” which covers more than 120,000 medical doctors annually. This system’s development has had many benefits, but among the indirect benefits is the accumulated experience in the business model formulation and implementation, which would benefit the government in many other e-Government projects.

What are the impact of your initiative and the lessons learned?
The systems’ reliability, convenience and efficiency are its foremost success factors, without which it would have surely failed. It was due to these high-level factors that it was very well received by the public. Another important success factor for the project is the effective project management by MSAD which coordinated between different stakeholders in the project. The project’s impact cannot be neglected. The public in Egypt are now much more open to more e-Government services (compared to how they before). University enrollment was an excellent choice of a service to undertake to build trust in the initiative. The university enrollment application project is the result of the fruitful co-operation between five government organizations: Ministry of State for Administrative Development, Ministry of Education, Ministry of Higher Education, Ministry of Communications and Information Technology and National Sports Council. This promotes cooperative and integrated work among them or groups of them in the future. The relevance of data collected and generated in the university enrollment service opens a door for a lot of electronic services for universities, students, and decision makers. Such services include hostels enrollment, students’ transportation support, university student affairs, and many others which would help decision makers plan and utilize the available resources better. The project’s success and the Egyptian e-Government Portal enabled covering more specializations such as general certificates and doctors charging service (which is executed 11 times annually) which eliminates the need for external interfaces, multi-systems and applications previously deployed. The same module can be used to deliver more services with very little changes and minor investment. The project provides additional benefits that range from standardization and lower maintenance by means of solution unification for more sectors/services (one system instead of multiple systems) to easier, greater and more accurate reporting capabilities utilizing one database while reducing error and increasing efficiency, credibility and accessibility for beneficiaries to their own records. This project also provided a good example of cooperation between the public and private sector for better serving the public and reducing the government expenses which can be used in other sectors.


Institution Name:		Ministry Of State For Administrative Development
Institution Type:		Government Department
Contact Person:		Lina El Sayyad
Title:		Technical Office Specialist- MSAD
Telephone/ Fax:		(00202) 24000108
Institution's / Project's Website:		(00202) 24000261
E-mail:		lelsayyad@ad.gov.eg
Address:		13 Salah Salem St
Postal Code:		11789
City:		Cairo
State/Province:
Country:		Egypt

The Problem

Solution and Key Benefits

Actors and Stakeholders

(a) Strategies

(b) Implementation

(c) Overcoming Obstacles

(d) Use of Resources

Sustainability and Transferability

Lessons Learned

Contact Information