Anna Dorsey | Student Life

After over 30 years of usage, WashU is moving on from WebSTAC. WebSTAC, a software used for housing, billing, and course registration, will be replaced by Workday Student in time for fall 2025 registration. The switch to Workday is being carried out through a project called Student Sunrise.

The Student Sunrise team, tasked with handling the transition to Workday, highlighted the old age and lack of modernization in WebSTAC as main reasons for making the switch. 

Senior Associate Provost and Executive Director of Student Sunrise Project, Erin Culbreth, said that WebSTAC is no longer supporting the school efficiently. 

“Our systems were built in the 1990s, so they’re quite old. They’re really just not modern anymore,” Culbreth said. “They don’t support things like mobile [device usage], and there’s a lot of barriers to how they’re architected that make it difficult for us to manage academic priorities.” 

Abigail Johnson, a first-year, said that she has struggled to use WebSTAC in the past.

“The registration process was really confusing. The housing portal crashed when we tried to select move-in slots, and I’ve noticed other things like this happening often,” Johnson said. 

Culbreth said the idea to find a system that better supported WashU’s programming needs started over seven years ago.

“Roughly around 2016 and 2017, the institution, broadly, was working on strategies to refresh and replace our core administrative systems,” Culbreth said. “At that point in time, there was a process to select a vendor that we would go with as an institution, and Workday was the one that was selected.” 

Culbreth said that Workday will be more user-friendly and solve many of the problems, such as website crashes, associated with WebSTAC. She also said that Workday is expected to enhance the user experience for both students and faculty by offering a more capable platform.

“We’re trying to aggregate the things students are going to need into a dashboard approach,” Culbreth said. “Hopefully that will make it easier to get oriented and do all the things that you need to, in one system.”

The transition is expected to take place gradually throughout the next year in order for the system to be completely implemented for fall 2025 registration. WebSTAC will still be used for spring 2025 registration, but will thereafter be obsolete, according to an email by Project Director of change management for the Student Sunrise team, Ellen Rostand. 

Meghan Street, a recent WashU alum on the Student Sunrise executive team, said that students should look for email updates on Workday’s implementation from her team.

Some students, like Johnson, say that they are not familiar with Workday and are unsure of what is expected of them at this time.

“I know that Workday is replacing WebSTAC, but that is about all. I have absolutely no idea what I should be doing in the meantime,” Johnson said. “I just don’t know anything about it.”

Culbreth and Street both recommended that students attend a drop-in “Mock enRoll” event to get acclimated with Workday. Street said that the events will offer instruction on how to check academic balances, review records, and register for courses through Workday.

“We highly encourage attending Mock enRoll in November,” Street said. “Not only is it an opportunity to preview and practice the new system, but you’ll also get what we’re calling a ‘backstage pass’ and you’ll be able to play around, explore, and practice some of those things you’re nervous about.”

Mock EnRoll events are open-house style and require no preregistration. Street recommended visiting WashU’s Student Sunrise website for more information, including dates, on the events.

Street said that she is anticipating some growing pains using the new system, which is why she wants students to start paying attention now. 

“I think it’s going to take a while for students to get used to all of the changes,” Street said. “Which is why we want to get the word out as early as we can.”