Manage Clinical & Non-Clinical Experiential Learning

How One Education Program Connected Placements, Data, and Reporting in One System

Penelope Theodoropoulos

April 17, 2026

When we hosted our recent session with Dr. Tara Kaczorowski, Executive Director of Education Programs at Daemen University, one theme came up quickly: how difficult it is to bring data together when it lives in different places.

More specifically, what happens when placement data, assessment data, and candidate information all live in different places.

If you’re managing field placements today, you may be using a system for hours tracking, another tool for evaluations, and your SIS for student data. Reporting often lives somewhere else entirely.

It works, until you need to bring it all together.

Dr. Kaczorowski’s experience at both a large public institution and now a smaller private university gave her a clear perspective on this challenge. And at Daemen University, it became the starting point for change.

When Student Fieldwork Data Lives in Different Places

When Dr. Kaczorowski joined Daemen University five years ago, fieldwork management processes were not centralized.

Fieldwork had been managed by a part-time staff member, and when that person left, there was no longer a clear system in place. Information lived across paper forms and disconnected files, making it difficult to track placements, hours, and candidate progress in one place.

At the same time, the program was preparing for its next accreditation report.

Without a centralized system, that work required tracking down information across files and formats. “I felt like I was constantly chasing things down,” Dr. Kaczorowski said.

For many programs, this is where the strain shows up. Day-to-day processes function, but reporting requires assembling information after the fact.

Managing Complexity Across Programs and Campuses

Daemen University’s structure added another layer of coordination.

The program includes undergraduate and graduate pathways, along with two campuses serving different student populations and operating on different calendars.

Dr. Kaczorowski’s experience at a large public university gave her a clear lens into what scalable processes should look like, even in a smaller environment.

“We really just needed a tool that we could use to look at everything together,” she shared.

That visibility became the foundation for moving forward. Not just tracking placements but understanding how everything connects across the program.

Building an Integrated Approach

After evaluating different options, Dr. Kaczorowski and her team selected CORE by PeopleGrove and approached implementation with intention.

“We took a step back and recognized that our undergraduate programs and our graduate programs operated very differently,” she explained.

That’s a common starting point. Most programs are not operating as a single, uniform structure, even if their systems treat them that way.

At Daemen University, they configured the CORE system to reflect how their programs actually run:

Separate program paths for undergraduate and graduate programs
A third structure for the Brooklyn campus with alternate certification pathways

“So right in CORE, we started from the beginning by saying, let’s organize our field placements based on these very different use cases.”

That structure allowed placements, assessments, and candidate data to live together in a way that matched the reality of the program.

What Changes When Data Lives Together

This is where the shift becomes visible.

Before implementing CORE, fieldwork management at Daemen University relied heavily on one person managing documents, tracking hours, and keeping everything organized across systems and files.

With a centralized system in place, that responsibility no longer sits with a single individual.

“We’ve actually not had the need to replace that position… now we can collaboratively manage that… because it’s all in one place, and we can do it from anywhere.”

Instead of tracking information down, the team now works from a shared source of truth. Placement data, evaluations, and candidate progress are accessible in one place, making it easier to stay aligned across roles.

Time savings followed.

We had a twenty-hour-per-week part-time person managing this, and we didn’t need to replace that role. That alone says a lot.

Dr. Tara Kaczorowski

Executive Director of Education Programs

Daemen University

For many programs, this is where the impact becomes tangible. Less time spent coordinating and verifying information, and more time focused on supporting students and partners.

Faculty and staff can see how candidates are performing within specific field experiences, making it easier to understand variation across placements and build a clearer picture of candidate progress over time.

Because that data is structured and connected, the program can adapt as requirements change. As graduation and certification expectations evolve, the team can adjust how performance and fieldwork are tracked without rebuilding processes or reconciling data across multiple sources.

This flexibility is reinforced by the implementation experience itself.

“The onboarding experience was seamless… they really listened to our context and helped us design solutions… thinking outside the box.”

A More Connected Way Forward

In working with institutions like Daemen University, this is often where the conversation lands.

Many programs today manage placements, assessments, and student data across multiple systems or spreadsheets. That approach can support coordination, but it makes it harder to bring everything together when visibility matters most, especially during accreditation and reporting cycles.

Daemen University’s experience shows what becomes possible when those pieces are connected.

With an integrated system in place, teams can:

Access placement, assessment, and candidate data in one environment
Reduce time spent tracking and reconciling information
Build reports with greater confidence
Support accreditation requirements with clearer visibility
Adapt to evolving requirements

For programs evaluating their current approach, the question is not whether the data exists. It is whether it is connected in a way that supports the work ahead.

Learn more by speaking with a CORE for Education expert.