Elements and Functions of an Effective Information System

A New Student Information System

Your school district (or educational training organization) has determined that it is not ready to meet its responsibilities to comply with the new data reporting demands from the state and federal legislation. The existing student information system needs replacement, or at the very least an upgrade. You have been asked to be a committee member and help critically evaluate the market of software publishers who claim their products are SIF (or SIS) compliant. The committee is made up of school board members, and key administrators, teachers, local business leaders, and parents in the community.

At an initial meeting, a fellow committee member asks what SIF stands for and why it is important to the selection process. Another member feels that no vendor should be contacted until the committee lists components for an effective information system that will also conform to requirements set forth in the state and federal legislation.

Assignment Expectations
After reading the Module 1 articles, please summarize in 3 or more pages (not including the cover sheet and bibliography), what you told the committee. Be sure to define SIF, and illustrate 'why' or 'why not' vendors should be contacted to help.

Include a list of at least three references, one of which must be other than those provided in the assigned readings. (For help locating the additional reference, click the TUI Library button at the top of this page. Feel free to do additional research as necessary. As Master's level students, it is expected you have good research abilities.)

As always, this assignment may be focused on your preference of higher or secondary education.

Anonymous (2012). What's all the hype? TeAchnology Website. Retrieved May 2012 from
http://www.teach-nology.com/tutorials/databases/print.htm

Developer Works (2011). Schools interoperability framework and SOA - An interoperability bridge. Retrieved August 2013 from
http://www.ibm.com/

Institute of Education Sciences (2012). Tables and figures search. Retrieved May 2012 from National Center for Education Statistics Website: http://nces.ed.gov/quicktables/

National Association of State Boards Of Education (2012). Retrieved May 2012 from http://www.nasbe.org

SIF Association (2012). Various White Papers that relate to the discussion Retrieved August 2013 from
https://www.sifassociation.org/NewsRoom/Pages/White-Papers.aspx

U.S. Department of Education (2012). Proposed priority: Technical assistance on State data collection, analysis and reporting - National IDEA Technical Assistance Center on Early Childhood Longitudinal Data Systems; CFDA Number 84.373Z; Federal Register Extracts. Education Department Documents and Publications. Retrieved May 2012 from ProQuest.

U. S. Department of Education, (2007).* No Child Left Behind and Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA). Retrieved May 2012 from http://www.ed.gov/nclb/landing.jhtml

Washington State School Directors' Association (2011). The role of school boards in improving student achievement: Guiding principles from WSDCA. Retrieved May 2012 from Eric (ED521566). http://eric.ed.gov/?q=ED521566