Elements FAQ

Symplectic Elements is a faculty activity reporting system from Digital Science. It replaced the Watermark DMAI product in the Fall of 2024. Elements will be the repository demonstrating the work and achievements of IU’s faculty.

Annual Reviews for faculty will take place in Elements using the workflow module. Discovery Profiles, a public profile module, which allows faculty to directly control the content and update as needed, will be launching during the 2025-2026 academic year.

After careful consideration and evaluation, a task force, comprised of nine faculty and nine staff members, made the recommendation to transition from our DMAI application to Symplectic Elements for our Faculty Activity Reporting needs. This recommendation was based on input from faculty across the organization on the needs and opportunities to better support your work.

The transition to Elements aimed at addressing current issues with data entry and reporting, enhancing user experience, improving efficiency, and providing you with better tools to manage and report your academic activities. Elements offers several advanced features that will streamline the reporting process and provide more comprehensive insights into your scholarly endeavors.

Elements@IU is now available to all faculty via One.IU.

When you first log into Elements, you should see all of your previously entered DMAI data as well as any data that Elements has harvested from it’s IU-internal and external sources on your behalf.

Several data sources will be automatically fed into Elements including:

• Several data sources will be automatically fed into Elements including:

  • Grant information from Kuali Coeus (KC) is fed into Elements for awarded grants
  • SIS - Courses information from SIS is fed into the “Courses Taught” activity type. Course data will be fed into Elements shortly after all of the sections an instructor is teaching in a given term have begun.
  • Human Resources Management System (HRMS)- new accounts will be created overnight to allow access for logging into the application along with employee title information will populate users profiles with IU appointment data.
  • Harvested publications data – from a variety of bibliographic databases.
  • CHRIS database – IU School of Medicine faculty will also see additional information fed into their profiles and activities from the CHRIS database.

Course Data from SIS is fed into the “Course Taught” activity type within Elements.

Teaching has been integrated into Elements in a new way to enhance the experience for faculty and better showcase their teaching efforts on our campuses starting with 2024 courses data and forward. Previously, each unique section was imported into DMAI, which was cumbersome for faculty who teach multiple sections of the same course or multi-section courses. This process required extra effort to accurately represent the innovative work our faculty do in the classroom.

In Elements, we import one record for each unique course a faculty member teaches in a semester. This record includes the number and type of sections and the total number of students, saving faculty time in annual reporting and more clearly representing their work in public profiles (e.g., web profiles).

For IUSM faculty, course data is fed from the CHRIS system into the Medical Student Education activity type. This includes all courses taught within the IUSM curriculum across Phases I, II, and III. This data is aggregated from MSAS and MedHub following the conclusion of each academic year.

Publication data is harvested and available from a variety of data sources. The following data sources are searched automatically or available for faculty to self-search: arXiv, Dimensions, MLA, ORCID, PubMed, Scopus, SSRN, and Web of Science.

Crossref is available and refreshed monthly, searching based on identifiers claimed within Elements.

Google Scholar is available for searching when entering a record manually, however if you use Google Scholar regularly, you can import your works by importing a .bib or .ris file directly into Elements. For more information on how to import Google Scholar publications into Elements, please visit the full guide and screenshots on our Support Materials page.

Integration with the IU ScholarWorks repository will be coming in Fall 2025.

Course Data from SIS will be fed into the “Course Taught” activity type within Elements.

Teaching will be integrated into Elements in a new way to enhance the experience for faculty and better showcase their teaching efforts on our campuses starting with 2024 courses data and forward. Previously, each unique section was imported into DMAI, which was cumbersome for faculty who teach multiple sections of the same course or multi-section courses. This process required extra effort to accurately represent the innovative work our faculty do in the classroom.

In Elements, we will import one record for each unique course a faculty member teaches in a semester. This record will include the number and type of sections and the total number of students, saving faculty time in annual reporting and more clearly representing their work in public profiles (e.g., web profiles)."

Symplectic Elements is a European product which uses British English. While some screens and fields are configurable, many British spellings are hard coded and we have opted to match the hard coded language for consistency throughout the product.

Acting on feedback from faculty on the former system, there are very limited required fields in Elements. For the majority of activities, the only required fields are a title and date. All required fields are indicated with a red asterisk *. All other fields are optional, and it is not expected that you enter data into every field. It is up to each faculty member how much information is necessary for each activity.

Yes! The Elements Team holds near-weekly Office Hours as well as regular Elements trainings, open to all IU faculty and staff. Find the schedule, Zoom links, and other details on our Office Hours & Trainings page.

Asynchronous training materials, such as recordings, handouts, and step by step guides are available at our Support Materials page.

Yes, administrators with appropriate role permissions can pull reports for their units. Guides for the Reporting Hub and Basic Reports tools are available on our Support Materials page.

Elements offers two main permission roles for admin users: Research Manager (RI) and Statistician (RI). Each role provides different levels of access.

Research Manager (RI) Role:  Research Managers (RI) can impersonate all members in their group. This role is typically filled by department or faculty administrators who assist with the day-to-day management of records. When you impersonate an end user as a Research Manager (RI), your actions are recorded in the item’s history.

Statistician (RI) Role:  Statisticians (RI) can run reports on the groups and members to which they have access. This role, when granted at the department, school, or campus level, allows users to generate reports available in the Elements system for their assigned groups. This role is usually best suited for Deans, Associate Deans, and Chairs, unless they also need the ability to impersonate or have delegate abilities.

A user can be granted both roles, allowing them to log in on behalf of faculty and run reports as needed for their assigned groups. Contact the Elements Team at elements@iu.edu to request a role assignment.

Yes! Elements is available for faculty to access and add to activities year-round.

Elements does not have the same attachment functionality as the former DMAI system. Rather than attach documents to an individual activity, files can be attached as part of the Annual Review workflow. Multiple URL fields are available on each activity which can be used to link to relevant webpages or document in cloud storage, such as OneDrive, Google Documents, etc.

Yes! View the Elements demo. (https://youtu.be/aca0GSxfbDw?si=zA3lceYJtfW7tDPX) 

Within Elements, you can control your own delegates. On the Account Settings page available in the Account menu, you can search for and add delegates. When you no longer need that delegate to have delegate access, use the trash can icon to delete that delegate.

Find the full guide and screenshots on our Support Materials page.

If you have been assigned as a delegate for an Elements user, log into Elements and look for the key icon at the bottom of the tool bar. Select that icon and then use the tool to identify and select the user you have permission to impersonate. 

Find the full guide and screenshots on our Support Materials page.

There isa wide array of ways you can manage activities in Elements. You can find guides on our Support Materials page that will show you how to manually add or edit activities, claim or reject activities, join or split records, and more!

On the details page for each item, the “Edit Type” button will allow you to quickly move an object from one activity type to another within the same category. The “Edit Type” button is the small pen icon next to the activity type at the top of each details page or summary section.

Unlike changing activity types within a category, it is not possible to change activity types between the categories.

If there is an activity in the category you would like the item to appear in which meets your needs, you may wish to manually re-enter it into that category. This is most useful for items that came in from DMAI that have more accurate activity types in the Elements model.

We would recommend using the Area of Excellence Label scheme to add a label reflecting the area (such as teaching, research, service, or librarian performance) you would like the activity to be reported as. Using the label will allow for activities to surface in their tagged areas in reports.

An example of this would be tagging a Professional Development activity, which resides within the Service & Leadership category, with the Area of Excellence label: Teaching. This would allow that item to be reported as a Teaching activity or searched for and pulled into an appropriate list of Teaching Related Activities on an Annual Review Workflow.

Find the full guide to using label schemes on our Support Materials page.

Contributions, or Annotations, provide the ability for Elements’ users to enter contextual information about their contribution to a specific activity. Contributions are specific to an individual and are not available to other contributors connected with the activity.

If a user enters a Contribution on an activity, that information is only visible to that user and any Reviewer assigned to a workflow exercise the activity is submitted. The Reviewer will only be able to view that information through the “View item details” screen.

You can review and adjust how Elements is searching for publications related to your Search Settings. Find the full guide and screenshots on our Support Materials page.

Reporting dates are automatically calculated by the system based on the date information the system has about a given activity. For many activities, a date field may be required but often a user will have multiple date types to pick from.

Activities with a single date:

An activity with a single date field, such as Service & Leadership: Interview, will often require a date to be entered at the time of adding the activity to your account. This date will always be the reporting date used for a single date activity.

Activities with a start and end date:

An activity with a start and end date, such as Service & Leadership: Committee Membership, will often require that the start date be entered at the time of adding the activity to your account. A user can save an activity with a start and end date with only a start date and they can edit the activity to add an end date at a later time.

The system will read an activity with a start and end date as being reportable during the entire duration of the activity. This means that an activity with only an open date will read as on-going, being reportable from Date-present.

Activities with a series of reporting dates:

Activities with multiple stages, such as the publishing process a Scholarly & Creative Work: Article, will have a range of dates available to users, none of which are typically required. Due to the stages, the reporting date advances as the user adds additional dates to the item as it moves through the process.

For instance, a user may first enter an Article when they are preparing the article. Without an effective date to apply, this activity can be saved without a date and the date the record is added to the system is its original reporting date. When the article is submitted, the user can edit that same article activity and add a date to the Date Submitted, which then becomes the reporting date. This process is repeatable as the faculty moves their activity through the stages of Activity Created in Elements, Submitted, Accepted, and Published.

When manually entering a Grant & Contract activity in Elements, follow these steps to assign roles such as Principal Investigator (PI), Co-Principal Investigator (Co-PI) or Supporting Personnel:

1. Indicate Your Relationship: In the first field, specify your relationship with the grant.
2. Add Additional Investigators:
   • For IU-affiliated investigators: Search for the individual using their last name and select them from the drop-down list. IU-affiliated investigators will initially be assigned the role of “Personnel” on the Grant & Contract activity.
   • For non-IU-affiliated investigators: Enter their name manually to add them to the activity.
3. Claim Activity:
   • Once the additional investigators claim the activity in Elements, their role can be changed via the “Relationships” section.
4. Edit Relationships:
   • Navigate to the “Relationships” tab of the activity.
   • Select “Users” and click the “Edit” button next to the investigator’s name to modify relationship types or reporting dates.

Annual Review exercises will open for faculty access on December 15^th. Faculty will have access to the Elements system all-year.

You can access your Annual Review Workflow two core places in Elements: the My Actions carousel on the homepage and via the main menu, in the “Evaluations & Review” under “My Submissions.”

Yes, the Annual Review Workflows support attachments.

Elements activities are the building blocks of the Annual Review Workflow exercises. Annual Review exercises capture activities and allow faculty to display them to their reviewers in context with attachments and other additional information.

When you open your Annual Review exercise for the first time, the Elements system will search all the activities on your Elements account and automatically populate your exercise with activities with Reporting Dates for the calendar year in review.

For more information about reporting dates, see the question above “How do reporting dates work in Elements?”.

After you have opened your Annual Review exercise, the easiest way to add activities to that Annual Review is directly within the exercise.

Locate the list of activities you want to add an item to and click the grey plus (+) sign on the right side of the list to “Select Items.”

At the top right corner of the “Select items” screen, there will be a “+ Add New Category Activity” button. Select that button to begin the manual entry process. When you complete the manual entry process and save the record, it will automatically add the newly created activity to the list.

In each section of the Annual Review (Teaching Activities, Research & Creative Works, and Service & Leadership), there are category related activity lists. Related lists allow you to pull activities from a different category into that specific section of the review.

Use the grey plus (+) sign button on the right side of the list to “Select items.” You will be presented with a full list of the activities in that category for the year in review. Locate the item you want to include in the section and press the “Add” button next to the activity. You will be asked to confirm this action and upon clicking “OK” the activity will populate the new list and presented to your reviewer(s) as a part of its new section.

Using a related list within an exercise will not move the original activity’s location on your Elements profile.

Once you submit your Annual Review exercise for review and it routes to your reviewer(s), you will no longer be able to edit the contents of the exercise. You will still have access to the Elements@IU system and can still interact with the rest of the system, add activities, or edit your profile as needed.

If you accidentally submit your exercise too early or submit and then realize you have forgotten something, please contact your Reviewer; your assigned Reviewers will be able to return the exercise to your level in the workflow.

Once your review is completed, it will be stored in Elements and available to you as needed.

Access previous reviews completed in Elements at any time, by navigating to the “My Submissions” page available in the “Evaluation & Review” section, under “Evaluation.”

Reviews and related materials are accessible only to the faculty member, designated reviewers and viewers, and a limited number of system administrators. Because reviews are considered part of the faculty personnel file, the Academic Affairs office on each campus may also have access to view these reviews.

Local administrative units assign Annual Review Workflow exercise roles by submitting the Review Assignments Template to the Elements Team. Review roll assignments are due to the Elements Team on October 15^th.

There are three roles available within the workflow module.

Reviewee: The faculty member being reviewed.

Reviewer: The direct supervisors, Committee Chairs, Department Chairs, Associate Deans, Deans, and other school leadership who will leave reviewing comments directly in Elements.

Viewer: Committee members or departmental administrators who need to view but not leave comments within Elements.

Access assigned reviews from the “My Actions” carousel on your Elements homepage, or by navigating to the “Assigned Reviews: Review Processes” screen available in the “Evaluation & Review” section, under “Evaluation.”

Access assigned reviews by navigating to the “Viewable Exercises: Review Processes” screen available in the “Evaluation & Review” section, under “Evaluation.”

As a Reviewer, you will have an evaluation scale and a comment box on each section of the review exercise. You will have a section titled, “Reviewer Summary & Attachments” which will have a place for an overall evaluation scale rating, comment box, and an attachment tool. 

Final Reviewers will have access to a tool for Indiana Code 21-39.5 compliance.

While faculty members will not receive notifications when review scores and comments are left in the system, the system prioritizes transparency and allows faculty to view comments, evaluation scale ratings, and attachments as they are saved.

A final summary report for each review will be available for all Annual Review Workflow exercises, capturing and combining content provided by the faculty member and the Reviewer(s) in the workflow tools.

Discovery Profiles will be launching during the 2025-2026 Academic Year.

The best way to prepare for the launch of Discovery Profiles is to ensure that your profile within Elements@IU is as complete as possible. The more information you provide, the better the Discovery Profile search engine will be able to identify you when users are searching for faculty profiles.

• Upload a profile picture
• Complete the Overview, Research Interests, and Teaching Summary sections.
• Review and adjust the Fields of Research labels applied to your profile. We recommend using no more than 5 labels at a time.
• Add any educational history, language competencies, personal Web Addresses and Media links you would like displayed on your profile. The Discovery Profiles include an embedded tool which allows YouTube videos to be displayed directly in the browser.
• Review historical data – Review any historical activities carried forward from the DMAI Watermark system. Adjust activities privacy to reflect your preference.
• Review pending publications – Only claimed activities may be shown on your Discovery profile.
• Add relevant activities – Depending on where you are in your career, you may want to add more activities or focus on specific items.

A video guide for this process will be available soon.

When populating Elements with activities from prior years, we recommend you input a range of activities that makes the most sense for you as an individual.

If you are going through the Promotion and Tenure process in the future, where you may be using reports from Elements to build your dossier, you may want to include everything.

If you have been in the field for many years and are beyond the P&T process, you may only want to input new activities or your career highlights you may want to showcase.

Most faculty will find themselves somewhere in the middle of these two statuses, in which we recommend an approach that best aligns with how your academic unit plans on utilizing Discovery profiles.

In Elements, you can set your profile to either “Public” or “Internal.” A profile set to Internal will not display in Discovery Profiles. Once Discovery Profiles are available, toggle the selection to Public to enable your profile in Discovery.

Visitors to the Discovery Profiles site will be able to search for faculty based on name, keyword, or discipline. Results can then be filtered by Campus and School.

Only profiles which are Public will be visible to visitors.

We are working with UITS Departmental Solutions to explore how Elements@IU and Discovery Profiles can assist with this need. Please contact the Elements Team directly if you are interested in learning more by emailing elements@iu.edu.

We are working with UITS Departmental Solutions to explore how Elements@IU and Discovery Profiles can assist with this need. Please contact the Elements Team directly if you are interested in learning more by emailing elements@iu.edu.

All data entered into DMAI prior to its retirement on August 1^st, 2024  transitioned into Elements as part of its implementation. This data migration was completed in early 2025.

We were unable to move the attachments over as Elements does not support that on the activity screens.

While the Elements Implementation Team did extensive work mapping DMAI activity data to the fields available in Elements, many items were entered into DMAI using “other” field types. These “other” items may match newly available activities or sub-types available in Elements, but due to the volume and variety of data to be migrated, the Elements Team was unable to tease individual records out from these “other” categories.

We encourage users to use the new types available to them in the manner they best see fit, be that editing migrated DMAI activities or only using the new activity types when entering new information into Elements.

The last day to access DMAI was October 31, 2024.

If the copy within DMAI was the only copy of an attachment you had access to, please email elements@iu.edu for support.