Starfish Information for Students

Starfish: Student Success Platform

What is Starfish?

Starfish is a student success platform that provides students, faculty, and staff an interconnected system to stay engaged and communicate questions and concerns more easily. The use of Starfish on our campus can help improve the efficiency and efficacy of supporting our students, connecting them to the appropriate resources, and improving student success and our overall retention.

Click on the sections below to learn more about how to use Starfish, as well as why it will help you at St. Lawrence.

Click on this link to log into Starfish: https://stlawu.starfishsolutions.com/starfish-ops/

_____________________________________

•  You can schedule meetings with faculty and staff. You'll be able to see their office hours and availability and sign up for a meeting without having to e-mail back and forth. It will also sync with your Outlook calendar and give you reminders, so you don't forget about your meeting. This video walks through how to make an appointment with an instructor or advisor.

• You can easily ask for help (even when you don’t know who to ask!) – just click on the “I Need Help” link, which will allow you to select from a list of areas where you are seeking help or allow you to just write out what you need. Your advisors and the relevant campus staff members will be notified and they will respond to your questions and get you the help you need. This video covers how to use this really handy feature.

• You can connect with campus offices and resources through the Services directory. You'll get all the contact info, office hours, and even be able to schedule meetings with staff in Starfish. In addition, in your Success Network, you will see all of the faculty and staff with whom you have a relationship (your academic advisors, coaches, current-semester faculty, etc.), plus some of the crucial campus Services utilized by all students. You will be able easily and quickly to connect with whoever can help you. This video walks you through how to schedule an appointment with a service.

• Watch this Starfish Overview video (transcript available) to help you begin familiarizing yourself with it.

• Set up your Starfish profile. Watch this video (transcript available) for a step-by-step tutorial.

• Watch this video for information on how to schedule an appointment.

• Check out your Student Success Network (transcript available). These are your instructors, advisors, and coaches. 

• Canvas is a learning management system (LMS). It is used by students to access course materials and to engage with course activities and assignments. Some of your professors may use Canvas to distribute readings, texts, videos, documents, and other media for the class. Canvas is specifically tied to your current courses and the instructors that you currently have.

• Starfish is a student success platform. It allows you to easily connect with all of the people who are connected to you (e.g. your current professors, advisors, coaches, and other staff members you have a relationship with). It's also used to help faculty and staff share concerns that they have about students, alerting the right people with the best supports to help you on campus.

• All people who are connected with you (e.g. advisors, coaches, etc.) are also connected with each other. This will allow your network of mentors to communicate with each other better to help get you the support you need to be successful at SLU.

• It will also be easier for them to let you know if they are worried about you in or outside of your classes. You may receive e-mails from Academic Support offering help with specific concerns in your classes. Don’t be afraid of this! We’re here to help.

• Faculty and staff can also send you notes when they see you doing a good job. These are called “kudos” – small messages of encouragement and appreciation for your efforts.