Oct 15 2025 | Abbi Duhart | News Editor
Starting next calendar year, students at Western will be facing a major upgrade in their Portal experience with just that — “Experience” — taking Wolf Web’s place. Experience is accessible to students right now, and contains key information students need for university resources.
Contrary to popular belief, the decision to make the change from Wolf Web was not university-wide; rather, it was a decision made by Ellucian, the parent company of both Experience and Wolf Web. Ellucian is not part of the university, but manages softwares like the Portal through their Banner service. Essentially, Ellucian decided to make the change from Banner 8, which included Wolf Web, to Banner 9, which will replace Wolf Web with Experience. In simpler terms, this means that Western’s Portal will be transitioning from one version to another. All in all, the reasoning behind adding Experience to the Portal was due to the fact that Wolf Web will no longer exist.
Experience is fully functional right now, but things are still being added to it as the year progresses. University Computing Solutions, the department in charge of the change, decided to keep Wolf Web active along with Experience until the end of the year so that students and faculty can adjust to the change without being thrown headfirst into using Experience. Ultimately, Wolf Web will completely disappear Dec. 31 and be fully replaced by Experience.
The biggest issue with Wolf Web is that it’s just very outdated. It was created 20 years ago, so it is not up to the standards of today’s technology. One of the goals of UCS was to enhance Experience to look much better and cleaner than Wolf Web did. Christopher Lopez, the web applications developer, explained that a large goal was to make sure it looked more aesthetic with better usability, meaning it will be easier for students to find the information they need. While the change is necessary because Wolf Web will disappear, the switch is also seen as an improvement in order to modernize the Portal.
A big way that Experience is aiming to improve over Wolf Web is by becoming more user-friendly. Rather than having to click through multiple links in Wolf Web to find a page, Experience will have a section for each important resource. For example, to register for classes, students can navigate to Experience and find the specific section for it, rather than using Wolf Web and needing to go to the student menu, then registration and schedule, then register for classes, then hunting down a CRN code on top of everything else. Experience will create a much easier and quicker process. Additionally, Wolf Web has multiple obsolete links that are not needed.
Experience will have all the same features, but will look much more modernized and clean. Students won’t lose any of the features that were previously found in Wolf Web, rather, they will just be found in a new spot. Students can use Experience to access their registration, billing, financial aid, barcode and other university resources. One new feature unique to Experience is the student barcode. Students can go to their account and see their WOU barcode, which acts the same as student IDs and can be used at places like the Health and Wellness Center and Hamersly Library. Unlike Wolf Web, students can also go into Experience and customize their dashboard to include easy access to things they use often.
University Computing Solutions is slowly working to add Portal functionality in general to Experience. Many things accessed from the Portal, such as Canvas and Zoom, are slowly being integrated into Experience in the hopes that one day the entirety of Portal will be swapped for Experience. While this is a goal of UCS, it has no confirmed timeline. Experience is being added, but the Portal is not going away at the end of the year, only Wolf Web is. Lopez explained that this is a common misconception with students right now.
While change can be hard, UCS firmly believes that not only will these changes help the Portal look better, but they will also help students access vital resources faster and more smoothly. The transition from Wolf Web to Experience will be beneficial to both students and faculty after the adjustment period.
Contact the author at howlnews@mail.wou.edu
