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Category Archives: School Districts

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Greater Efficiency in Human Resources Leads to Greater ROI

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This post is part of The Datamation Guide to Human Resources Records.

In any industry, time is money. Usually, the longer something takes to do, the more it costs, and that includes any kind of Human Resources process within your business. Paper documents are outdated, inconvenient, cumbersome, and most importantly, they reduce your company’s efficiency. And with less efficiency comes a lower return on investment Datamation can provide your company with the tools it needs to implement a solid workflow that will save time, money, and effort while increasing your ROI!

In HR processes like onboarding, training, or payroll, the amount of information that must be shared between departments (originating with yours) is huge. With each employee having several types of documentation filed away, thousands of papers cross HR department desks each week.

The problem with paper is that it can’t be effectively processed in such large amounts. It takes a huge amount of time to find the paper document, pass it from approver to approver, and to finally refile it. The longer it takes to process information, the more money it costs your company.

The only way to drastically reduce processing time is to scan your documents into an automated workflow, eliminating the need to pass along each record or file by hand. This keeps documents from getting misplaced, and also gets them through layers of approval quickly and efficiently.

On average, an employee spends 19.8% of business time trying to find a certain paper document, adding up to about one full day a week. Think about how much more would get done if it took just a few seconds to find a document, and how much of that time could be directed towards targeting problem areas of your company. When you scan your files and store them electronically, any document can be found within just a few seconds with a simple keyword search. The ability to find documents quicker leads to quicker processes in general, which in turn vastly improves customer service. Your company’s time is valuable—make sure it is used wisely.

With the amount of information that crosses your desk on a daily basis, you don’t have time to search for documents that have gone missing or that are stored among thousands of other documents in a filing cabinet. The more time it takes to complete one of your many tasks, the more money your company is spending to keep those processes going. Integrating your documents into an electronic workflow with Datamation will make your company’s processes more efficient, more timely, and less cumbersome.

Call (630) 321-0601 today to discuss the perfect plan for your business.

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2018-04-20 00:00:00

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Use an Automated Workflow to Leverage Your Financial Data

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This post is part of The Datamation Guide to Human Resources Records.

Having total visibility into your company’s financial data is vital to future decision making and effective allocation of resources. Working with paper records that contain this information makes it incredibly difficult to gather and analyze the data that you need to make better choices. Scanning your financial documents and creating a workflow gives your company full visibility into every aspect of your finances, giving you the tools you need to make the best decisions for your business.

The process can be broken down into two steps.

Step One: Quantity Your Data

The first step to leveraging financial data is to quantify it. Having the right data on the number of employees, salaries, recent raises, turnover rates and comparisons, employee performance, and resource allocation can be extremely helpful in making important financial decisions. The difficult part of this is working with paper copies of all of these data sets is that gathering, compiling, and forming reports from hundreds of different paper sources takes time and often wasted effort.

With Datamation, those numbers and that original data can be quickly and accurately compiled into a clear report that can be faxed, printed, and distributed widely. There is no longer any need to spend hours or days searching through piles of documents to gather data, read it all, and make it into a comprehensive report—everything can be generated automatically and can be used immediately.

Step Two: Put Your Data to Use

After that data is gathered, its time to put it to use. Salary and performance data can be used to track talent within the company, or financial data can be mapped out to see where valuable resources are going, and much of this data combined can be used to assess your business’ general well-being and performance. From this data, your company can make well-informed decisions that are backed up by hard numbers.

It is becoming increasingly important for both employees and employers to have visibility into many of the company processes to measure both personal and company-wide progress. The generated data is helpful in looking at the company’s performance as a whole, its performance in specific departments, or both.

Wrapping It Up

Having accurate, comprehensive data for your company’s performance allows more confident decision making that is based on hard data. It also allows you to target areas that visibly need more work, or employees who may be performing well without being noticed.

Using paper documents, compiling all of the this data for your company would be difficult and time consuming. Datamation allows you to access all of your documents in just a few seconds, and can automatically generate the reports you need for your company to perform its very best.

Call Datamation today for a quote!

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2018-04-20 00:00:00

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Natural Disaster: Planning and District Recovery

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This post is part of The Datamation Guide to Managing School District Records.

Natural disasters are a part of life. And while they can’t be prevented, they really need to be planned for. When your district undergoes a fire, flood, or earthquake, you may lose vital records for both students and employees. Losing student records can have detrimental effects on the students continued education.

By digitizing all student and staff records, your district can focus on what is most important—making sure that education is not delayed.

The destruction of a student’s paper records can exacerbate the other effects of a devastating natural disaster. In addition to the disruption of friendships, mentorships, and plans, the students family may have suffered personal and financial losses.

When records are destroyed but the student has to resume school, it’s possible that he or she has to retake exams, or redo class assignments. Worse still, if the student uses special services, those services may be delayed or even stopped until the district completely recovers. So when you put all of this together, it creates an environment that just isn’t conducive to productive learning, and the ultimate goal of disaster recovery should be to help your students continue their education without a misstep.

Because you can’t prevent natural disasters from happening, the best thing that you can do for your district now is to plan ahead. Always have an emergency preparation plan!

To prepare an emergency plan, you should:

1) Assess the possible hazards that your district may face. If you’re in an area that is susceptible to flooding and earthquakes, prepare for flooding and earthquakes specifically, but also be sure to be prepared for the unexpected.

2) Plan for how to reduce those risks. Again, while you can’t prevent them, the effect can be reduced by safety planning.

3) Test your plan. By putting those plans and practiced skills into action, you can see if that plan is effective and well-thought out.

4) Revise your plan based on the test. If you found areas of weakness or areas where the plan is not totally airtight, fix them and keep testing until it is.

A huge part of this planning is making sure that student records are as secure as possible, and the best way to do it is to scan and store them digitally.

When you scan with Datamation, not only can all of the records be scanned quickly and efficiently, but they can also be placed into a document management system that allows you to access any record with just a few clicks, and can place any record into a workflow.

When it comes to disaster recovery, scanning student and staff records means that each and every record will be impervious to physical damage, virtually eliminating the need to recover records. This allows your students to continue their education seamlessly—one less thing on their plates when disaster affects their lives in so many other ways.

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2018-03-21 00:00:00

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Freedom of Information Act: What Can be Accessed?

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This post is part of The Datamation Guide to Managing School District Records.

The Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) is a piece of legislation that grants public access to certain documents that are in the possession of a government agency or public authority, unless some information is specifically excluded from that legislation.

Some examples of information that cannot be accessed under the FOIA are school transcripts, and school district records of attendance, though what can and cannot be released differs by state and local policies.

Here are some other examples of what may not be released under the federal FOIA law:

● Information involving the CIA

● Internal Agency Memoranda

● Personnel Matters

● Trade Secrets

● Classified Documents

● Law Enforcement Activities

● Litigation

● Confidential Government Sources

● Any information that violates an individuals privacy interests

● Civil Service Examinations

The federal FOIA law counts personnel and medical files as exempt from disclosure, but some state policies may not consider all parts of a personnel file exempt from disclosure.

What this means is that depending on your state and local policies, some information contained in a personnel file may be legal to disclose to the public. Information can be released as long as it is approved for release by state laws, local policies, and school board rules. If information would be considered an outright invasion of privacy by the average person, then it is generally not allowed to be released to the public.

Additionally, school officials and board members fall under the same category as the public in that they must follow the same policies to obtain information. As a school employee or member of the public, it is important that you understand your local and state policies regarding what can be released and what cannot be released.

If you are requesting information by filing an FOIA request, you may have to pay a fee to have the information compiled. Fees are only waived for members of the media and educational institutions whose true purpose is to educate the public on whatever information they believe should be released. When information is denied, the requester must be told why within 10 days of the request being made.

The bottom line is that there are some states that have different standards as to what should be kept private and what can be released to educate the public under the FOIA. It is important that school staff are aware of what these different stipulations are in their state or district in order to fully know their rights.

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2018-03-20 00:00:00

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Superintendents: Do What’s Right for Your District

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This post is part of The Datamation Guide to Managing School District Records.

As the superintendent of a public school district, we know that you wear many hats. You are the CEO of a multi-million dollar company. You have to balance the responsibility to your community and compliance with state and federal regulations. You oversee complex labor negotiations, intensive record-keeping, and a workforce of hundreds of professional educators and support staff all while maximizing taxpayer resources.

Datamation understands that in such a high-pressure environment you need solutions that save money and make life easier. As a leading record-keeping and workplace automation software vendor, our education specialists understand a wide array of software options that accomplish these goals for school districts of every size. We will learn your needs and, with access to all the leading industry software, design a system that satisfies them.

The easiest way to earn the trust and confidence of so many stakeholder groups, school board members, taxpayers, parents, teachers, and students is to demonstrate efficiency and competence in your day-to-day operations.

Here’s how we can help with that.

Government compliance and document security

Superintendents know better than anyone the amount of work school districts must do to remain in compliance with federal and state education law, including the new updated SOPPA guidelines. Eliminate costly and time-consuming filing mistakes by clerical staff by converting your existing paper archive to a secure paperless student record database. Paperless record retention also makes fulfilling Freedom of Information Act requests simpler and less time-consuming.

In addition to the simpler compliance and open records, one of the benefits of a paperless database is the ability to secure your districts documents from accidental loss or destruction. You don’t have to live in the path of a major storm like Hurricanes Harvey or Irma to face the kind of disaster that can wipe out years of legally required documents. The unfortunate reality is a fire or flood can happen anywhere. Protect your districts crucial information with a paperless document archive that will survive any accident or natural disaster.

Meet tight deadlines for grants and other application deadlines

Grant applications that supplement your district’s budget can often come with short deadlines and require lots of information in order to be considered. Help your staff meet those deadlines and improve your districts bottom line by providing simple document storage and recall. No more fishing through a dark cold storage warehouse for a decade of records to fulfill a grant application. With just a few clicks, your employees will be able to gather the data necessary. What used to take a week can take a day or less with automated workplace solutions and electronic student records.

Increase employee morale and save money

Too often, superintendents are faced with a trade-off: Boost employee morale or implement difficult budget cuts. By implementing the various automated workflow solutions we offer school districts, you don’t have to make that choice. Eliminate the tedious record-keeping that teachers and support staff dislike, reduce your paper costs dramatically, save space in your buildings, and free up employees’ time to focus on the core mission of educating children.

Seamless implementation and customer support

Datamation’s education specialists provide in-person support for every step of your software implementation. We listen to your needs, work with you to design a software solution that functions within your existing IT infrastructure, and train building staff on how to use it.

Some companies hand you their software and training amounts to a few tutorial videos and a 1-800 number you don’t have time to call and they don’t have time to answer. Our customer support is unparalleled, so even after you implement a paperless student record system, if there’s ever a problem, we’re there to help solve it.

In addition, there is no up-front cost, no long-term commitment, and no licensing fees, so you can have unlimited users for any of the software solutions we offer.

Have any other questions or ready to get started? Contact Datamation today!

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2018-03-19 00:00:00

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Special Ed Directors: Providing the Best Service for Special Needs

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This post is part of The Datamation Guide to Managing School District Records.

As the special education director, there is perhaps no one in your school district more aware of the challenges paperwork can present to day-to-day workflow. A single special needs student’s IEP can generate a file inches thick with government-mandated reports, health records, and counselor assessments. Proper maintenance of those files is subject to government auditors.

But more even more importantly, those files are a critical tool used to ensure the most vulnerable and challenging students to educate are getting the attention and care they deserve.

Here’s how you can cut down on the paper with Datamation’s help.

Save space and time with digital IEPs

Anyone who works with special needs students knows their IEP, or Individual Education Program, is everything for that student’s educational history and future goals. That means it must be accessed by every member of your staff who is responsible for interacting with that student. This includes teachers, counselors, psychologists, teacher aides, building administrators, and parents or guardians.

By nature, a single paper file is not really helping the goal of information sharing. Digital IEPs offer all stakeholders a chance to access needed records without having to chase down a single file. Additionally, many special needs students spend a portion of their school day outside the regular school class schedule. Digital IEPs are accessible from building to building and teacher to teacher, eliminating the possibility files can be lost or misplaced.

In addition to the convenience of digital IEPs, your school district can drastically reduce the amount of physical space dedicated to paper files.

Specialized software for special needs

At Datamation, our education specialists work with all of the industry-leading software companies. Other competitors try to offer a one-size-fits-all approach, but we understand that the special education department faces unique challenges and has precise needs to service children with physical or developmental disabilities.

We offer the right software solution for your districts specific needs and make sure that all of our software can work within the existing IT and digital framework in place. Additionally, we can convert every existing file you have into the software solution we design for you, eliminating the frustrating carryover period.

Caseworker support

A district’s special education department is only one facet of the larger infrastructure needed to help some disabled children. Many are also paired with government caseworkers or social workers to assist them in their home life. Oftentimes there can be a disconnect between outside caseworkers and the child’s school district that exists simply because those individuals do not have access to the same records you do. That is an easy solution, and one Datamation can help implement.

Caseworkers can be given select access to relevant portions of a special needs students file to help assist caregivers who are responsible for the child in the home. This solution allows you to remain in compliance with student privacy laws but can be an invaluable tool for the others entrusted with your students’ care when the school day ends.

In-person software implementation and training

On top of everything you already need to get done, learning new software is probably not your immediate priority. That’s why our education specialists conduct in-person software implementation and staff training. Other companies hold generic one-way webinars plopped into the middle of an educator’s already hectic workday that are impersonal and do not offer the ability for individual questions to be answered. With Datamation, you will receive the personal attention of someone who’s trained specifically to show you the benefits your new software can provide.

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2018-03-19 00:00:00

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How Does FERPA Work?

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This post is part of The Datamation Guide to Managing School District Records.

FERPA refers to the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act, which is designed to protect the rights to privacy that a student has over their school records. This act applies to all schools who receive valid federal funding under the U.S. Department of Education.

Before a student turns 18, the parents or guardians of the student are entitled to determine the privacy of their child’s records, but these rights transfer to the student at age 18 or if the student pursues education beyond high school.

In order for schools to release a student’s educational information, the law requires that the school have written permission from a parent or the eligible student. The only occasions in which the school can release information without written consent are as follows:

● When a school official is showing genuine educational interest in a student

● When the records are released to the school the student is transferring to

● When the party requesting the records are doing so to provide the student with financial aid

● When an organization is conducting a study for a school

● When the records are needed to comply with a judicial order or lawful subpoena

● When they are needed by appropriate officials during a health or safety emergency

● When they are needed by state or local authorities of the juvenile justice system

Maintaining compliance with FERPA is difficult and time-consuming when your district is working with paper records. Finding the right records among thousands takes time that you often don’t have. Paper records are also a huge security liability, highly susceptible to fire and water damage, and easily accessed by those who don’t have permission. When you scan and digitize student records with Datamation, your district becomes the perfect candidate for some of Datamation’s FERPA-compliant programs.

We work with a program called Scriborder that makes it easy and incredibly secure to request and send transcripts and other student records. Each request can be fielded directly from your school website through one portal. When the records are sent digitally, if there is a security or other issue in transit, that private student data is immediately captured. This way, student information is safe, even while it is being sent. Scriborder eliminates the worries that accompany sending out private student information.

ImageSilo is a program that allows your district to store all of your records in a digital cloud, making it safe, accessible, and organized. With five levels of security, only those with strict access can see student record information. Because the information is being stored digitally, it is also always protected from floods, fires, and any other natural disasters. At the same time, any record can be accessed with a simple keyword search, making them easy to find in the event of an emergency.

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2018-03-18 00:00:00

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Automated AP Processing Can Save Your District Money

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This post is part of The Datamation Guide to Managing School District Records.

While most industries face issues with manual accounts payable processing, schools simply don’t have the funds to waste on the extra costs that come with manual data entry and processing. Manual processing is costly, error-prone, and time-consuming between approval, matching, data entry, and more. Manual processing is outdated, and luckily, unnecessary when you automate your AP processes with Datamation.

The average invoice costs $22.75 and 16.3 days to process—and that’s just a single invoice. Between cafeteria food vendors, equipment vendors, and more, the average school district handles hundreds of invoices per year.

The amount of resources that go into AP processing reaches beyond money—employees who enter this data could be spending their time enriching student experience. Besides being a waste of valuable resources, manual entry is subject to a sizable margin of human error. When employees spend hours reading and entering numbers, it’s probable that tired eyes will lead to mistakes, which are costly and time intensive to fix.

When AP processing is automated, the difference is dramatic in the amount of time and money saved. Automated invoices cost $3.40 and 6.1 days on average to process. Every step of the process is automated, and the costs of printing, mailing, matching, and fixing data entry mistakes are eliminated.

In addition, companies who automated their AP processes were able to take full advantage of prompt pay discounts, which are offered to businesses who pay their invoices early or on time. On average, only 16% of districts and businesses who don’t automate are able to take advantage of prompt pay discounts. Comparatively, 47% of districts or businesses who do automate are able to use these discounts.

Better still, the money saved by automation can be put towards better equipment, more educational programs, and funding for clubs or teams. Without having to spend time entering data, staff productivity will increase and be directed towards school-wide improvement.

Datamation can take AP processing from an inefficient, time-consuming chore to a streamlined, nearly effortless workflow. The changes made to this process have widespread benefits: higher employee productivity, huge savings, fewer errors, and more funding for the important things within your district.

Datamation can make a world of difference in how your district runs, and gives you only the best results for the well-being of your students and employees.

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2018-03-14 00:00:00

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Digitizing School Records for Better Communication

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This post is part of The Datamation Guide to Managing School District Records.

While there are numerous benefits to digitizing student records, one of the biggest benefits is that communication between schools within a district, and even between different districts, is vastly improved. Datamation offers a time-tested and secure solution to the growing number of student records as students enroll into and transfer from your schools.

Datamation can take every single record from the schools in your district and digitize it. Depending on your preference, they’ll either pick them up and bring them to their secure scanning facilities, or scan them on site. Because our barcode system allows you to track the progress of the scanning process, you’ll always be kept in the loop. You can even access the documents digitally during the scanning process, if needed.

The real benefits begin when the scanning is finished.

Rather than having to dig through piles of paper to find that one specific record, any record can be found within seconds with a simple keyword search. This is ideal for medical emergencies, or any other instance in which a students records would been to be accessed quickly.

Digitizing student records also protects them from physical harm, like fires or floods, and from being seen by unauthorized personnel. Under FERPA, or the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act, student records must be kept private and secure with few exceptions. Datamation offers FERPA-compliant storage programs that keep student records safe, and also ensures that your district is compliant.

If your district is finding that its difficult to manage and send requested transcripts or other records, Datamation offers Scriborder, a program that allows your district to manage all record requests (transcripts, transfer requests, etc.) from one portal on your schools website.

Scriborder allows your school to send out records to students requesting any document that they need for college or employment reasons. Students or alumni may request their records directly on the school website, which can be processed and sent out electronically.

Once the record is sent out, the requester is immediately notified. If there is an issue or the record is intercepted as it is mailed, the students data is immediately captured before it can be seen.

Because Scriborder works out of your schools current website, it doesn’t take much to train staff how to use it. Scriborder even sends out their own employees to train your staff, making the transition painless.

While digitization and Scriborder with Datamation generally make communication within a school or district more efficient and smoother, being able to quickly access and send records has the potential to make any kind of student transfers easier.

With paper record keeping, finding those student records can take an unnecessary amount of time that could be spent bettering your district. When records are immediately accessible and can be sent electronically, it also makes sending them from one school to another much more efficient. What took days before the records were scanned now only takes seconds, simplifying student and record transfers. Scanning your student records with Datamation not only improves communication within your own district, but also allows for effective exchanges between neighboring districts.

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2018-03-14 00:00:00

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How Do Schools Determine Compliance?

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This post is part of The Datamation Guide to Managing School District Records.

It is legally necessary that student records are kept for a certain amount of time, often until long after the student graduates or leaves. These records contain information like the student’s name, address, contact information of the parent or legal guardian, grades and test scores, health and discipline records, attendance records, and more personal, vital information. How long this information needs to be kept often differs by state or even by school district.

Most public schools are required by law to have some kind of records management policy in place. With the help of administrators and the school’s legal counsel team, the school board makes a plan that stipulates how long it is appropriate to keep student records, often based on state standards. Making and following this kind of plan prevents schools from being penalized for destroying a record too soon.

It is necessary to keep records in the event of an investigation of a student or a lawsuit against the school. If either of these scenarios occur and there is no documentation to support either events, the school itself is liable to punishment.

When your district is working with paper documents, having to remember the right date to destroy old records can be tedious and prone to error. These files also take up huge amounts of space when stored in boxes and filing cabinets, not to mention that they are extremely susceptible to fire and flood damage. Recovering these documents after a disaster is difficult and painstaking, and can take time that your district doesn’t have.

Digitizing your records with Datamation can make document compliance effortless. After your documents are scanned, you can use one of many enterprise content management (ECM) systems offered to implement retention policies that keep track of compliance dates for you, eliminating the need to manually keep track of the dates and the worry of non-compliance. Besides compliance, scanning your records allows for quick access, organization, and storage in the digital cloud or a single disk. Your records are also always safe from physical harm and natural disasters.

Maintaining compliance is lawfully necessary, and more practically, it helps protect your school from being unprepared during student or employee investigations and lawsuits. It’s up to your district to create a compliance and retention plan, but that plan will always be optimized when your district scans student and employee records.

Make compliance organized and effortless with Datamation.

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2018-03-14 00:00:00

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