Appleton Area School District Request for

Proposal of Student Management System.

AASD Student System Request 2/3/03

1. INTRODUCTION: ....................................................................................................................................... 3
2. GENERAL REQUIREMENTS:.................................................................................................................. 3
A. SCHEDULING 40%........................................................................................................................................ 4
B. SITE BASED ADMINISTRATION (GUIDANCE AND ATTENDANCE) 15% .......................................................... 6
C. GRADE BOOK AND STUDENT/GUARDIAN ON-LINE ACCESS 20%................................................................... 6
D. SYSTEM CONSIDERATIONS 15%................................................................................................................... 8
E. CENTRAL BASED ADMINISTRATION (PROGRAMS AND REPORTS) 10% ......................................................... 8
3. USERS............................................................................................................................................................ 9
Three tiers of scheduling = Elementary, Middle, High .................................................................................. 9
Secretaries = Guidance and Attendance ........................................................................................................ 9
Administrative Reporting = Attendance, Ethnicity, Special Education, Free and reduced, trend analysis,
GPA comparisons, ad hoc report building, etc............................................................................................... 9
System Analysts = data mining and relational structure, flexibility to add fields/tables, queries, and the
ability to export the schema for easy layout of the data structure.................................................................. 9
Teachers = gradebook and report functionality............................................................................................. 9
Parents/guardians = on line access.............................................................................................................. 10
4. TIME FRAME:........................................................................................................................................... 10
A. TRAINING ................................................................................................................................................... 10
B. SUPPORT .................................................................................................................................................... 10
C. IMPORT OF OLD SYSTEMS ........................................................................................................................... 11
5. STIPULATIONS: ....................................................................................................................................... 11
Product sign off............................................................................................................................................. 11
Relational Database...................................................................................................................................... 11
Building of Schedule and first time training for Master Schedule Build...................................................... 11
Payment of the system................................................................................................................................... 11

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AASD Student System Request 2/3/03

1. Introduction:
Appleton Area School District (AASD) is seeking to partner with a Student Based Information System
in order to provide proper reporting and student schedules within the district. The vendor partnering
with Appleton Area School District shall meet all of the criteria indicated within this document, or offer
full detail as to an acceptable solution from Appleton Area School District.

AASD has a student population of 15,000. However, Appleton Area School District needs to maintain
information on the parochial systems within its borders to assist with some joint programs and to ease
the transfer of students within the city boundaries. Thus, the actual count of students within the system
may be higher.

AASD has a data warehouse built upon Microsoft .NET that houses much of the past student
information. The new student system must be able to transfer information to that system on an
automated transaction, without human interference of importing and exporting. On occasion it will be
necessary to import and export from the student management system (SMS) into the data warehouse.

The system must be built on the foundation of a relational database. Preference is given to either
Microsoft Sequel or Oracle. Any other database will have to prove its standard of data integrity and the
ability to automate the transfer of data between the SMS system and the AASD data warehouse.

The SMS application must have complete solutions for Wisconsin state reports, high school scheduling
(which includes block, flex, and multi-week schedules), parent/guardian access, free and reduced meals,
special education, food services, transportation (bus routes), disciplinary actions, fees for co-curricular
and curricular activities, and an ad-hoc report writer.

2. General Requirements:
APPLICATION SOFTWARE SPECIFICATIONS

Minimum specifications for the student administration system are listed below and in the Software
Requirements and Hardware Requirements sections of this bid.

A. Proven software: Only fully integrated software packages which have been in operation for at least
one year, in a district of a like size to Appleton Area School District will be considered. References
must be provided.
B. The system must be a WEB Server product that is capable of being networked for access by multiple
users. The system can be configured to support the unique administrative needs of elementary,
middle, high, continuation, and vocational schools. Client server applications are allowed for central
personnel, as long as it has no more than 2 upgrades per year, and operates from a network share.
C. All schools shall be supported in one central database. Other options may be considered, but
preference is given to a centralized system.
D. The system must provide a suite of standard reports, which can be used as templates for creating and
saving user-defined reports.
E. The system must provide throughout its modules multiple sort and selection capabilities, i.e. sort
and/or select any number of fields maintained within the system
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AASD Student System Request 2/3/03
F. A demonstration of the system will be required of those vendors who appear to meet the majority of
the specifications.
G. All student information and instructional management system software applications must be totally
integrated. The system must have an integrated scheduler, gradebook, and student management.
H. An upload/download capability must be provided to transfer student data to and from the student
management computer to the district data warehouse system.
I. The system must have the ability to add/transfer/drop individual student information electronically
on a real-time basis from school to school.
J. The system must provide user-defined tables and provide data validity at entry time to assist
Appleton Area School District in migrating data into the new system.
K. The software must include an access level system for restricting access abilities and data for
different users down to the field level.
L. The system must provide the security feature of preventing specified teachers or counselors from
accessing information or updating information managed within the system.
M. The system must allow Appleton Area School District to control and create new screens (forms to
meet the needs of the schools, the district office, the teaching and the administrative staff).
N. The system must allow Appleton Area School District to define new data fields, co-view the data
and to construct new screens to enter and maintain defined data and views.
O. On-site training and telephone support must be available on an ongoing basis. Telephone support
must be made available during normal working hours.
P. All systems must be fully documented. Documentation must be available on CD and browser based.
Customer must be able to print unlimited copies.
Q. The system must provide end-user and technical on-line browser based documentation.
R. ODBC Compliant Database: Ability to use Oracle® or Microsoft MS SQL as database at
district level.
S. The system must provide context sensitive browser based on-line help.
T. The system is capable of displaying multiple years.
U. The system is able to both import and export data to and from 3rd party software, in various formats
including text.
V. The software includes an optional report designer module for users to create custom reports that can
be viewed and saved in HTML, PDF, or Excel formats facilitating transfer of data via electronic mail
or via posting on the Internet. A Report Designer should be available as an option for users that want
to design and/or modify reports.
SELECTION CRITERIA:
The evaluation groups are made up of varying specialties from across the district, with varied interests about the
student system. Therefore, the vendor will be able to meet with the specialized groups and concentrate on the
following questions. The questions will include the following, but are not limited to the following questions.
More weight will be given to the presentation for the individual groups than to written documentation about the
following questions. However, if a system does not meet certain criteria from the following questions, it may
be excluded completely from being considered.
The evaluation groups will meet with the following breakdown components:

a. Scheduling 40%
As the scheduling component is the heart of any student management system, the majority of the
selection criteria rest with this component.
i. Does your system support block scheduling?
Yes No
ii. Does your system allow for each school to have a separate schedule?

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AASD Student System Request 2/3/03
Yes No
iii. Does your system allow for period attendance as well as daily attendance, dependent
upon the school choice?
Yes No
iv. If a class section is moved in the schedule, do the grades and attendance follow the
section?
Yes No
v. If a teacher is moved from a section and replaced by another teacher, do the grades for
the section remain intact?
Yes No
vi. Is the master scheduler on line and integrated into the relational database?
Yes No
vii. Can counselors or secretaries adjust individual schedules once the master schedule is
built with an on-line application?
Yes No
viii. Is the scheduler WEB a based application?
Yes No
ix. Can you use a routine to mass add, delete, and/or change classes in the schedules of
selected students to resolve the conflicts in their schedules?
Yes No
x. Does the system have the following Course Master reports: evaluating scheduling
results, resolving conflicts, and final printing? Provide examples.
Yes No
xi. Does the system provide a report that lists the course number , section, name of course,
teacher, room number, total number of students scheduled in that section, number of
boys, number of girls, and max enrollment for that section?
Yes No
xii. Does the system allow for walk in scheduling by guidance?
Yes No
xiii. Does the system allow for mass scheduling of lunch and study hall?
Yes No
xiv. Can the system have courses of varying credit increments (1/8, ¼; ½) for one student?
Yes No
xv. Does the system allow for mid test or final exams as independent from the regular
schedules?
Yes No
xvi. Does the system allow for cross enrollment of students between various schools?
Yes No
xvii. Does the system allow for one teacher to be scheduled at multiple schools?
Yes No
xviii. Does the system allow for alternative electives for student selection and weigh the
criteria against elective requirements?
Yes No
xix. List the possible constraints that your system can handle within the master schedule
build? For example: room, teacher availability, and class requirements…
xx. Does the system allow for a student to enter class elective choices on-line?
Yes No

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AASD Student System Request 2/3/03
xxi. Is the scheduler flexible to handle non-regular meeting hours, for example the class
meets Tuesday and Wed. for two weeks, and then Tuesday, Wed., and Thursday for 4
weeks, and then back to two days?
Yes No
xxii. Does the system allow for multiple teachers to have 1 class section?
Yes No

b. Site based Administration (Guidance and Attendance) 15%

i. Does the system offer on line attendance for the faculty with real time reports for the
school office?
Yes No
ii. Does the system offer a quick report for individual teacher classes attendance for end of
day verification?
Yes No
iii. Does the system allow a quick interface for the office to scroll through multiple
students to declare absence or tardy?
Yes No
iv. Does the system allow for a quick report of GPA’s for honor roll reports?
Yes No
v. Does the system allow for weighted and non-weighted grading on a centralized level?
Yes No
vi. Does the system allow for easy transcript reporting?
Yes No
vii. Does the system allow for walk in scheduling to be done by a counselor with conflict
reports and the ability to override or maintain constraints if necessary?
Yes No
viii. Does the system allow for easy lookup of student by last name or student number?
Yes No
ix. When adding a student, does the system check to see if a duplicate student may already
be enrolled but inactive, or active at another school?
Yes No
x. When adding a student, does the system look for a potential sibling, from which to
import demographic data?
Yes No
xi. Does the system have an ad hoc report writer for central office?
Yes No

c. Grade book and Student/Guardian on-line access 20%

i. Do assignments/grades transfer with the students if we switch the class hour they are in?
Yes No
ii. Does the system have the ability to integrate the grades that students earn with what they earn
at their homeschool (morning schedule)?
Yes No
iii. Does the system have the ability to print their grades from cross-enrolled school with the
grades from the homeschool on one report card?
Yes No
iv. Can the gradebook enter a semester exam grade that can stand by itself so it can count as
20% of the semester grade?
Yes No
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AASD Student System Request 2/3/03
v. Does the gradebook system have an import feature for teachers who may use
spreadsheets?
Yes No
vi. Does the gradebook have the ability to erase or maintain comments from one grading
period to the next?
Yes No
vii. Does the gradebook allow for a district bank of comments and a personal bank of
comments as well?
Yes No
viii. Does the gradebook allow the teacher to copy assignments or tests from one class to
another?
Yes No
ix. Does the gradebook allow for an automatic e-mail to parents who request the
information by e-mail, without the teacher having to maintain the e-mail addresses?
Yes No
x. Does the gradebook allow for the teacher to post assignments to a WEB based portal?
Yes No
xi. Is the gradebook a browser based applet from the centralized server?
Yes No
xii. Does the gradebook allow a teacher to not post grades or assignments still within the
gradebook, if the teacher does not yet want them published through a WEB portal?
Yes No
xiii. Can the district override the final grading scale of the teacher for district standards?
(Weighted grades)
Yes No
xiv. Is the gradebook a client server application?
Yes No
xv. Can attendance be taken from an on-line seating chart?
Yes No
xvi. Does the seating chart allow for pictures?
Yes No
xvii. Is the parent/guardian portal hosted at the district site?
Yes No
xviii. Does the parent/guardian portal offer real-time attendance reports by period if the
school takes period attendance?
Yes No
xix. Does the student have a portal for viewing assignments?
Yes No
xx. Does the student have a portal to view grades and attendance?
Yes No
xxi. Does the parent/guardian portal offer an area for more teacher comments or concerns?
Yes No
xxii. Can the system select options (by the district) that can be viewed by the parent/guardian
portal?
Yes No

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AASD Student System Request 2/3/03
d. System Considerations 15%
i. Is the system a relational database structured on Oracle or Microsoft MS SQL?
Yes No
ii. Is the vendor willing to share the schema for assistance to Appleton Area School
District technical personnel in order to facilitate data importing and exporting?
Yes No
iii. Does the system have a built in backup process?
Yes No
iv. Does the system have the ability to integrate with Microsoft Active Directory for
security?
Yes No
v. Does the system have a tiered group security for ease of setup?
Yes No
vi. Does the system have technical support from 7 A.M. CST to 5 P.M. CST?
Yes No
vii. Does the system have documentation to support the installation and maintenance of the
system?
Yes No
viii. Does the system have a process to list current users and log off the users if necessary?
Yes No
ix. Does the system have performance monitors built in to maintain the system?
Yes No

e. Central Based Administration (programs and reports) 10%

i. Does the system have an ad hoc report writer available for the district?
Yes No
ii. Does the system have the state reports for Wisconsin already generated?
Yes No
iii. Does the system allow for reporting on ethnicity by school?
Yes No
iv. Does the system have reports for English Language Learners by level of English
proficiency?
Yes No
v. Does the software provide a fees module that ads fees for grades, courses, student
groups/clubs, or individual students, that tracks partial fees for dropped courses, carries
over fees from previous years, and provides reporting by fee and course as well as
provides detailed transaction reports, and school summary reports. Account
management functionality should include 1) flexible allocation and reallocation of
payments, 2) provisions for multiple payments, 3) partial payment allocation to
multiple fees, 4) flexible entry of method of payment(s), 5) batch deposits, 6) individual
student accounts and family accounts, and 7) methods to track fees to be waived.
Detailed transaction records that track each payment, credit, and refund shall be
provided as part of the fees module.
Yes No
vi. Does the system have notifications and alerts to teachers signifying the student to be
special education?
Yes No
vii. Does the system have alerts for medical conditions?
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AASD Student System Request 2/3/03
Yes No
viii. Does the system have immunization surveillance and a report for immunizations?

Yes No
ix. Does the system have tracking of English Language Learners, who may be rated on
various abilities of knowing the English language as a second language?
Yes No
x. Does the system have a food program that allows for fees and menus to be
communicated?
Yes No
xi. Does the system have a process to mark the free and reduced students?
Yes No
xii. Does the system list transportation bus routes?
Yes No

3. Users
Three tiers of scheduling = Elementary, Middle, High
It is expected that the schedule is able to handle the diverse needs of the middle school
team concept, the flexible schedule needed for the high school systems, and for the ease of
an elementary system. Please be ready to demonstrate all of these options.
Secretaries = Guidance and Attendance
These site-based personnel are the main users of the system and have daily need for site-
based reports. Please be prepared to demonstrate the site based reports and ease of use
of the system. Please suggest a training process expected for the varying secretarial staff.
Administrative Reporting = Attendance, Ethnicity, Special Education, Free and reduced,
trend analysis, GPA comparisons, ad hoc report building, etc
The various central administrators will be interested in your special programs and ad hoc
reporter from the district level. Please be eager to demonstrate this, as well as basics
about how you handle the various special programs, which include:
1. Talented and Gifted
2. Transportation
3. English Language Learners
4. Special Education
5. Food Services
6. Fees
7. Curriculum and Instruction reports
8. Attendance and central reports.
System Analysts = data mining and relational structure, flexibility to add fields/tables,
queries, and the ability to export the schema for easy layout of the data structure
These individuals will want to see the system integrity and where you are going as a
vendor. Please be sure to share limitations currently expressed within your user group
discussions, and how you plan on overcoming those weaknesses. This will also be the
group to share your technical knowledge with, as they will plan to see how your system
will match up to our data mining processes under way.
Teachers = gradebook and report functionality
The gradebook must be fully integrated into the system. You must bring a strong
demonstration of the gradebook, including settings up assignments and weighting.

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AASD Student System Request 2/3/03
Parents/guardians = on line access.
This will also be presented to the teaching staff. You must show what a parent/guardian
can view and demonstrate the advantages to the teaching staff.

4. Time Frame:

Activity Date
Distribute RFP 2/ 4 /03
Responses Due: 2/ 26 /03 4:00 P.M. CST
In electronic format to Kim Meser in Microsoft
Word.; meserkim@aasd.k12.wi.us
Conduct Software Demonstrations M 2-17-2003
2-17-03 through 2-26-03; T 2-18-2003
Dates will be set in agreement with Vendor; W 2-19-2003
8:30-9:30 Central Administration TH 2-20-2003
9:30-10:00 System Analysts F 2-21-2003
10:30-12:30 Schedulers
12:30-1:30 Break
T 2-25-2003
1:30-3:00 Secretaries W 2-26-2003
3:30-4:30 Teacher/Gradebook
Award Contract 3 /10 /03
4:00 P.M. CST
Begin Implementation Activities Immediately upon contract
signing.
Location of presentations - Morgan Basement Lab, 120 East
Harris, Appleton WI. 54911

a. Training
i. All manual for the various groups are to be presented at contract signing in electronic
format. Appleton Area School District must have the ability to use the materials for
internal training and documentation to assist the end users.
ii. We will employ a “Train the Trainer” method of training our end users. The vendor
must assist on developing a timeline expected for the various groups that will use the
system. It is expected that we have a training system on-line by early May.
iii. The vendor will assist the schedulers for a period of two years to learn how to use their
schedule. This will mean providing a trainer for the master schedule build for the high
schools and the middle schools over the years 2003-2004 (for the next start of year
2004-2005), and 2004-2005 (for the next start of year 2005-2006). The year 2003-
2004 is already being scheduled, but the vendor will have to assist Appleton Area
School District in importing the schedule.

b. Support
The vendor will offer two years from the date of implementation of support for the
Appleton Area School District system personnel and the schedulers. All others users will be
charged as dictated by the vendor in agreement with Appleton Area School District on contract
signing. The vendor should supply support from 7:00 A.M CST through 5:00 P.M. CST
Monday through Friday, except United States holidays. These terms shall be worked out at
contract signing.

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AASD Student System Request 2/3/03
c. Import of old systems
The selected vendor will assist Appleton Area School District in migrating data from
older systems into their system by providing current schemas of their data structure and
demonstrating import processes commonly used, or any tools they have developed for
importing data.

5. Stipulations:
Product sign off
Appleton Area School District will pay for the student management system over the
school years of 2003-2004, and 2004-2005. Product sign off will not be until the second
year because of the need to use the scheduler for the first time in the second year. Since
the scheduler is the greatest impact of the system, Appleton Area School District wants to
extend the time for product sign off.
Relational Database
If the vendor decides to move away from the Oracle supported or Microsoft MS SQL
supported database demonstrated within the presentation, Appleton Area School District
will want a full refund of the application. It is our desire to work with the vendor in
developing this system, and we are selecting the vendor for this partnership. If another
database can be proven to be of sufficient strength, Appleton Area School District will
consider that as an option, but only upon mutual agreement between the vendor and
Appleton Area School District.
Building of Schedule and first time training for Master Schedule Build
The vendor will provide training for the Master schedule build in the school year 2003-
2004 for the next school year. This training is to be included within the contract. Final
contract sign off will not be until after the successful build of a schedule for all of the
schools within the district. Appleton Area School District will work with the vendor to
see that this happens as quickly as possible over the 2004-2005 school year.
Payment of the system
Because of the scheduling process being completed after the 2003-2004 school year,
Appleton Area School District will hold an agreed portion of payment until final master
builds are complete and the system is tested with these schedules. The vendor and
Appleton Area School District will work together to develop some agreeable terms of
payment over that extended period.

Digitally signed by Appleton

Schools

Appleton Schools DN: cn=Appleton Schools,

o=Appleton Area School
District, c=US
Date: 2003.02.04 11:21:59
Signature Not
Verified -06'00'

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