Wright State University has launched a smart phone app called Guide, which is designed to help students stay on track and connect to campus resources.

WSU is running a pilot project involving about 1,000 new students with a goal of introducing the app to all students next summer.

The app can send push notifications to students to remind them of important deadlines.

“We’re focused on how we can get students the best information in their hands at the right time,” said Tim Littell, an associate dean and executive director of Wright State’s Student Success Center.

“All of these things we’ve developed about how to use the resources on our campus, we tell them at orientation. We give it to them in printed materials and have it on our websites. But students don’t hear what they need until they need it.

“That’s where these tailored, individual experiences become powerful.”

The app is tied to WSU’s student information system and offers 42 different “journeys,” depending on a student’s course of study and needs.

“It’s an individualized and personalized set of paths, and if there’s data that indicates a student is falling off track, it will push information and notifications to a student’s phone to get them back on track,” Littell said.

The app can push surveys to students to gauge their progress.

“Ten years ago if you had said, ‘Hey, let’s use technology to help students.’ At a big, public-access institution like ours we’d say, ‘Yeah, but what about the students that don’t have technology?’ ” Littell said.

“It turns that even students who don’t have a computer or even internet at home, they’ll have a smartphone in their hand. This is a better way to communicate with students than ever before. We know they don’t read emails, but they do read those notifications on their phones.”