You spoke, we listened.

Riipen, the leading work-based learning platform, is excited to announce the launch of Riipen 2.0 this Spring. Our enhanced platform is a direct result of extensive feedback from our community of users, beta testing, and exclusive access to a sandbox. With Riipen 2.0, you can experience key user-driven enhancements that promise to elevate your experience in the most impactful and efficient way.

Over the past five years, thousands of employers of all types and sizes have partnered with academic institutions and student talent through Riipen to accelerate the growth of their businesses. With Riipen 2.0, our employers will access innovative features providing higher flexibility, customization, branding, reporting, control over their processes, focused navigation of the platform, new integrations, and much more.

What does it mean for you?

New terminology

To start, we've listened to your feedback and made significant changes to our terminology:

• Courses & Internship Programs: To simplify the user interface, “Courses” and “Internship Programs” are now merged into a single entity type, "Experience" (note that this vocabulary can be customized by each school), which allows educators to pick and choose which aspects of each experience they want to include. For example, a curricular experience with fixed start and end dates can now have students directly applying to work with companies.
• Students: “Students” are now called “Learners” to better represent project collaborators on the platform, i.e., students and lifelong learners as one single entity.
• Schools: “Schools" are now called “Portals”.

New Platform Navigation Features

We have also enhanced the navigation features on the platform:

Dashboard:

• The dashboard will display up to 5 pending match requests to improve visibility and facilitate request review and approval, and all pending requests will be found in the "Request Center".
• The dashboard will also present up to 4 "upcoming dates" or milestones, such as the start of an experience, the end of an experience, a project milestone, etc.

Platform Navigation:

• Employers will now navigate the platform as a member of one company at a time (if they have multiple companies on Riipen) and will be able to easily switch workplaces (or companies) and navigate through the platform as a member of that workplace (or company) via the sidebar.

Scope Negotiation:

• To ensure that expectations between educators and employers are better aligned before students begin work, we introduced scope negotiation as part of the match request process. As such, an educator may propose changes to an employer project, at which time, the employer can choose to accept or decline these changes before accepting the match.

New Propose Project Functionality

Educators can now directly submit a project to any company in the Riipen ecosystem that they would like to work with. If the company in question approves the project, it will automatically be accepted and added to the educator's experience.

Improved Messaging Functionality

Users will be able to archive conversations and send meeting invitations with videoconference links using Google Meet and Zoom integration. General UI improvements have also been made to make messages easier to navigate and conversations smoother.

Enhanced Employer-Student Feedback

With Riipen 2.0, employers will answer custom questions determined by the educators to ensure their feedback is more relevant to students and better reflects the type of work completed. Feedback will only be shared with the other party after both parties reply to ensure unbiased feedback.

What's Next?

We're always looking to improve our platform, and Riipen 2.0 is just the beginning. Soon, employers will be able to subscribe to new content notifications and be notified each time a new experience is posted that matches their filter parameters, and educators will be able to send mass updates to all employers and/or learners on their experience, allowing them to share their updates more efficiently. Additionally, users will be able to delete sent messages, and employers can add custom agreements to their projects that students will digitally accept, such as non-disclosure agreements or other required policies for their business.

What to Expect?

On April 20, 2023, during the launch of Riipen 2.0, there will be minimal scheduled downtime. Once it's completed, you'll be able to access the platform at the same URL you always have, and all of your existing data will be updated to the new format, ensuring that your access remains unchanged and all of your content and projects in progress are unaffected.

Our top priority post-launch will be actively gathering feedback to make continuous, ongoing improvements to Riipen 2.0. Automated tours and pointers will help all users find new features and identify how existing ones have changed.

Conclusion

Riipen 2.0 brings innovative features that give our users higher flexibility, customization, branding, reporting, control over their processes, focused navigation of the platform, new integrations, and much more. Our new platform is designed to elevate your experience and ensure that our experiential learning platform remains the leading platform in the industry. We're excited to see the impact Riipen 2.0 will have on your business.

If you have questions about how Riipen 2.0 may impact your experience, you can reach out to our Customer Success team at success@riipen.com.

We are thrilled to announce that Riipen 2.0 is launching April 20, 2023, and we can't wait for you to experience it. After listening to your feedback and conducting dozens of user interviews, we have updated and improved the platform to better serve your needs.

Riipen 2.0 maintains the features that you love from the current platform within a new and more intuitive interface. We have reevaluated and enhanced every area of the platform and added new features based on your feedback to make your experience even better.

What to expect

During the launch on April 20 there will be minimal, scheduled downtime, and once it's completed, you will be able to access the platform at the same URL you always have. All of your existing data will be updated to the new format, ensuring that your access remains unchanged and all of your content and projects in progress are unaffected.

Post-launch, our top priority will be actively gathering feedback to make continuous ongoing improvements to Riipen 2.0. As you navigate the new site, automated tours and pointers will help all users find new features and identify how existing ones have changed.

What's new

Navigation

For learners, the interface is transformed with the goal of streamlining and simplifying your experience. As it does today, your dashboard will show you your teams and experiences (previously called courses and internships) that you are a member of.

In the main menu shown on the left above, you will see the most essential pages for your own content, and your portal. Your portal is typically your college or university.

Switch portals

If you're a member of multiple portals (eg. your college and Level UP) you can switch between them by clicking on your user avatar in the top-right of the screen and selecting "Switch workspace."

New features

As you explore, you'll see some improvements such as the ability to send meeting invitations linked to Google Meet or Zoom through messages. Your educator can now access new settings that they may enable for you, including the ability to have teams set their own project dates, and the ability to have employers answer custom feedback questions.

An updated set of help articles launches on help.riipen.com on April 20 detailing all changes and how to navigate them.