ICONSkyward 2022 Large District Efficiencies John Davis

iCON Skyward 2022Large District EfficienciesJohn Davis

Orange County Public Schools is the 4th largest school district in Florida andthe 9th largest school district in the nation. We have over 206,000 students in 266 schools (including 41 Charters) whocome from 197 countries and speak 172 languages. We have 25,125 employees (over 14,000 teachers) and a budget ofapproximately 4 billion. We are the 2nd largest employer in Central Floridajust behind Disney . We pride ourselves in the fact that we have one of the lowest administrativeoverhead rates among the 67 Florida school districts. Because of this, wehave to be creative to find efficiencies that do not add to staff overhead.

Skyward Implementation Our Skyward system went live for all sites and all users on 7/24/2019 afteran 18 month implementation. We converted over 66 million records for just 5 years’ worth of historicaldata with an load rate of 99.27%. We utilize only the student suite and do not use the busing, ESE or foodservice modules. Emails and some other functions are also not used. Consolidated 7 student systems with Skyward implementation. In Florida we report about 500 pieces of data on each student to the FLDOE 8 times each year. Skyward responsible for 2 billion of district funding (approximately half)

SIS Department Structure SIS Department structure – 18 total staff Responsible for implementation of new student administrative systems,projects, support & maintenance of current and legacy student systems(3 current vacancies – in case you are interested in the great Florida weather & no state income tax)1 – Executive Director1 – Director1 – Assistant Director1 – Executive Assistant3 – Application Analyst IV (developer/programmer)4 – Application Analyst III (SQL/MSSRS reports)3 – Application Specialist IV (setup/configuration & Tier 3 support)2 – Application Specialist III (training & software Tier 2 support)1 – Database Administrator (Skyward performance, replication monitoring)

Skyward Environments 5 Skyward environments: Ability to refresh weekly Hosted with IS Corp Production (replicated)TrainingDevelopment (replicated)Quality Assurance (replicated)Sandbox SHED is our MSSRS reporting system

Skyward Interfaces

Skyward Replication – Pro2SQL (Progress) End users don’t use SkyBuild or Data Mining – thisis to ensure data consistency between reports. Only district Skyward support staff have access toSkyBuild and Data Mining – all end users utilizeSkyward reports or MSSRS reports. MSSRS reports provide for complex calculationsand they are setup to inherit Skyward permissions.(Staff who don’t see ESE screen - don’t see ESEreports in MSSRS reports).SHED ITEMVIEWSPROCEDURESREPORTSETLCOUNT6313794418PROD Replication DatabaseRowsSize1.65 B2.2 TBTablesFields2,65783,133Daily DB Requests (Avg)Daily DB Writes (Avg)Daily DB Reads (Avg)30 Billion90 Million240 Million

Automated Accounts & Logins SAML 2.0 (Security Assertion Markup Language) – integrated with our ADFS(Active Directory Federated Services) for staff & students. After logging into our network, staff & students click button on Skywardlogin screen – authentication happens automatically - no credentialsentered (unless outside of network). Our identify management solution handles all of the creation/deletion ofnetwork accounts and password resets. (Nothing in Skyward!) Once accounts are created in ADFS from HR system feed, Skyward account isautomatically created. (Nothing in Skyward!) Parents login through ClassLink with data (email or cell) from SkywardGuardians/Family screen. No one uses the Login ID & Password fields on thelogin page.

Parent Logins Parents log into 1 portal (ClassLink ) to automatically access Family Access,Canvas LMS, SchoolPay , and other parent systems. Parents can reset their own passwords and use multifactor authentication. Cell phone or email address from Skyward Family is used by parents toregister for an account. This is also used as their login to ClassLink . Cell or email must match data sent from the Skyward Guardian/Family screeneach night to authenticate. Some issues with staff entering duplicate guardian data in Skyward-we arecontinually monitoring & assisting schools with corrections. Skywardcustomization coming. About 180,000 potential parent users – about 35% log in at least 1 time duringeach school year (District Login History report is used to monitor this).

Automated Security Security is by module (Skyward screen) instead of role (admin, registrar). 3 levels of security: MAX-utilities, ACD-add/delete/change, INQ-view only This allows much more flexibility with assigning security which is specific toa single user, instead of giving them more security than they need. (Auditorslove this!) This required quite a bit of setup (over 90,000 security groups for our 250 schools), but pays off by not having to create 1 off security groups for just aspecific user (or assigning too much security). We have about 155 security groups at each site (same ones duplicated). About 100 staff move between schools each day – everything processedautomatically or by principals (Magnificent time savings!).

Automated Security (cont.) Customization uses the Job Code from our HR system (SAP ) and theSkyBuild Import Staff Import Utility (Assign Job Code Security Groups) toautomatically assign default Skyward security groups. Automated new security groups assigned if job title or site changes. (Wow!) Customization for Principals – ability to assign security permissions withoutgiving them full access to security. (Require Level 5 Access to Edit) Only 2 staff types are processed manually - itinerant school staff and districtwork locations. (These customizations saved us from having to add staff.) Automated Skyward account inactivation if staff inactivated in HR system

Automated Entity Configurations (Katalon Studio ) Katalon is basically QA software (automated test scripts) that canautomate repeated processes that have different variables (same setupneeded at each Entity in Skyward). Setup and maintain entity level configurations, templates, or any otherrepetitive manual tasks. Schools do not setup/maintain any configuration settings inSkyward – SIS team does all setup/configurations. Basic programming is needed, HTML, JavaScript, etc. Saved thousands of hours of work for SIS team since we have 250 schools. Katalon analysis picks up onscreen attributes from Skyward screen (fields,buttons, etc). Simple coding & built in tools then used to automate steps.

Automated Entity Configurations (cont.) Used for areas where cloning, or automated updating is not available Set up new school year, new Entities, state reporting templates, runninggrade calculations, cloning scheduling groups, changing bell schedules ofeach calendar, etc. Complete about 20,000 setup screens each year during Year EndProcessing (mostly Scheduled Tasks for 250 schools). Packages can be built, saved and reused in subsequent automation scripts(logging in, switching entities, clearing Skyward security cache, etc.) Biggest challenge is the differences in wait time for Skyward screens torefresh, but we just extend the wait time feature of Katalon scripts as weare developing these. Tool has some intuition built in for this.

Katalon Studio Demo Video

Governance – Started 2010 Getting the decision making out of IT and into the district departments. In the past, IT made all of the decisions about how the SIS was setup andconfigured, but this caused problems. IT didn’t know all of the rules and laws for each different area of studentdata. There were also conflicts between what the different departments weretold by the DOE contacts and what IT had interpreted. In 2010 the Business Analyst role was added to the student side aftersuccess on the HR/Finance side.

Governance - Teams Team of 8 Business Analysts in 4 different departments act as liaisonsbetween Business Process Owners and SIS team. They know the software and the department functions. They write functional requirements. No changes to any production system without requirements approved by aBusiness Process Owner. Business Process Owners (75) – district department leaders who areresponsible for 230 different areas of student data/processes. SIS team is like the builder constructing a building and the BusinessProcess Owners/Business Analysts are the architects of the building.

Governance - Prioritization of Work Prioritization of all work by Business Process Owners and Business Analyst,not SIS team – except Emergency or Production work. (This protects us!) Daily Priority List is generated that determines the order of the SIS teamwork – from our service request ticket system. (We don’t have to defend whywe are doing what work in what order.) System maintenance (Production) and emergency fixes are at top of theprioritization categories. Ability for Deputy Superintendent to escalate work on the Priority List afterjustification provided. Work time estimates are given for each ticket. This is used to assign work,ensure equality among SIS team members, and sometimes in evaluations.

BPO ListBPOBusiness ProcessesVacchio,Academic PlannerErinOwens,Academic Planner (K-8)KarlaAllen,Accountability CorrectionsBenjaminNeal, Staci Address unt,RebeccaAdmission, Enrollment, Recruitment (CTE)Adult Education and Adult ESOLAdvanced Studies CurriculumAICE, AP & IB Payout VerificationPriority nA-EST PriorityA-EST PriorityA-EST PriorityA-EST PriorityA-EST PriorityA-EST PriorityA-EST PriorityA-EST PriorityA-EST PriorityA-EST PriorityA-EST PriorityA-EST PriorityA-EST PriorityA-EST PriorityA-EST PriorityA-EST PriorityA-EST PriorityA-EST PriorityA-EST PriorityA-EST PriorityB-State ReportB-State nscriptsTranscriptsTranscriptsSkyward accessSkyward accessNeed TwoSWG110SHED FISHSAP InterfaceReports forDataView DataView DataView Update forDrilldownsSchoolCourseStudentESE DisciplineCOVID-19COVID-19COVID-19 TestMod of importRequest forNeededUpdateSWI-CTE SISCallDescGood morning,Good morning,Good morning,1/11 - Skyward1/11 - Skywardjean.mason@oSWG110alexandria.keyThe interfacerebecca.hunt@03.24 (SN) 03.24 (SN) 03.24 (SN) curitySecurityESEStudentStateData InterfaceTest a InterfaceSchedulingSchedulingESEStudent HealthStudent HealthStudent HealthSkywardOtherStudentDemographicsSkyward

Data Management Calendar Comprehensive look at all student data processing requirements for everysingle day in the school year for all teams. 967 current items in the list. Broken down by elementary, middle & high school levels. Responsibility and Business Process Owner areas are also listed. Schools and district departments can schedule when resources are neededfor what tasks. This reduces missed deadlines!

Communication All Skyward school communications are sent to “Site Coordinators”(typically the lead Assistant Principal) who is responsible for Skyward atthe site. They then forward on to the appropriate staff at each site (becausedifferent staff titles may be completing the same Skyward task at differentsites). Must be an administrator who is 12 month. Only Principal can change this person. SIS team only maintains 1 communication list!

We’re Happy to ShareJohn DavisExecutive Director, Student Information Systems, ITSOrange County Public Schools445 W. Amelia St., Orlando, FL 32801407.317.3200, ext. 2002567John.Davis@ocps.netwww.ocps.net

network accounts and password resets. (Nothing in Skyward!) Once accounts are created in ADFS from HR system feed, Skyward account is automatically created. . automate repeated processes that have different variables (same setup needed at each Entity in Skyward). Setup and maintain entity level configurations, templates, or any other .