Clever School District Whitepaper

Transcription

1 Clever School District Whitepaper

2 Clever School District White Paper Contents Introduction Service Overview Data Integration: A Modern IT Challenge The Clever Solution: An Easier Alternative Component Architecture Security and FERPA Compliance Real World Benefits Return on Investment & Efficiencies Return on Investment & Efficiencies Over 100 Applications use Clever Clever For Google Apps Making your Apps Clever Compatible Helping to Align your Data Warehouse Using Clever 9 Data Scoping 10 Ensuring Data Integrity 10 Coming Soon: Secure Single Sign-on 10 Conclusion 2013 Clever, Inc. All Rights Reserved. 2

3 Clever School District White Paper Introduction The Clever technology automates the secure transfer of student information between authorized parties (generally, from a school to a vendor). Clever replaces manual, vendor-specific processes, such as ed CSV files or vendor-specific bulk transfers, which are often insecure, inconvenient, or both. By comparison, Clever is engineered to be a far more secure and convenient way for districts to send vendors data. Today Clever is syncing data for well over 15% of U.S. schools, including the majority of the ten largest districts. This white paper will provide an overview of the Clever technology, outline popular use cases, and conclude with a walk-through of Clever s data management tools. Service Overview DATA INTEGRATION: A MODERN IT CHALLENGE The typical district shares student roster data with dozens of vendor applications. These applications, ranging from online learning and assessment to transportation, food services, and library management, all require timely and up-to-date student roster data. Districts use a variety of methods to provide vendors with updated data, but each method has significant shortcomings. Manually updating student records in vendor interfaces is extremely time consuming for administrators and teachers. ing rosters to vendors is highly insecure. Writing and maintaining custom SQL extracts or SIF Agents for each vendor is expensive and cumbersome. And the effort required to set up these processes can t be reused, since each vendor - and application - has unique data needs. As software is being deployed more and more frequently in districts, sending data to vendors creates significant security risks, costs, and painful delays. Because updating vendor rosters is so costly and painful, districts will often send vendors student rosters just once - at the beginning of the year. Even when districts send data more often, vendors often batch process less frequently. Outdated student roster data in applications creates hundreds of headaches. Without updated data, students are locked out of the software that districts have purchased, which frustrates students, adds to teachers workloads, and creates distrust of technology. For core systems like transportation and food service, outdated rosters can cause severe financial or safety problems. All too often, outdated rosters lead to purchased software going completely unused Clever, Inc. All Rights Reserved. 3

4 Clever School District White Paper THE CLEVER SOLUTION: AN EASIER ALTERNATIVE Clever was born out of a district technology director s frustration with this data integration problem. The solution was to make it easy for a district to securely share roster data with compatible vendor applications. Unlike other options available to districts, data integration with Clever is easy to set up, highly secure, and completely customizable. Clever s technology has been rapidly adopted because of how much time, pain, and risk it saves both vendors and districts. Clever was so easy to set up that I am still in shock. I ve been working with data systems and integrations for almost 20 years and this was by far the easiest. Ron Velez, Director of Management Information Services, White Plains Public Schools COMPONENT ARCHITECTURE The Clever architecture consists of three components: SIS data ingestion, SIS data validation, and a secure API available only to district-authorized vendors. Data Ingestion: Clever can ingest data from a district s student information system (SIS) using a variety of methods - depending entirely upon district preference. Using the most popular mode, Automatic, Clever s proprietary technology automatically and securely pulls student enrollment and demographic data from the student information system. Thousands of smaller districts have found that a non-technical employee can easily set up the Automatic sync in less than five minutes. Alternatively, larger districts may push the same data to Clever by running an automated.csv extract from their SIS database and sending it to Clever via secure file transfer protocol (SFTP). Data Normalization and Validation: Once Clever has received student information, Clever s technology carefully checks the data for missing fields, duplicates, or related errors, and normalizes the records into a consistent format. In the event of missing or invalid data, districts are notified promptly with data quality reports - making it easy to locate and resolve the specific issues Clever, Inc. All Rights Reserved. 4

5 Clever School District White Paper Clever API: Districts may authorize third party vendor applications to securely access student roster information via the Clever API. The district maintains full control over data sharing at all times, and may limit or expand the scope of the data being shared at the school or class level with a few clicks. Clever provides a secure, easy to use control interface for districts to manage what data is shared with each vendor. SECURITY AND FERPA COMPLIANCE Clever employs bank-grade security at the software and network level to ensure student data is always transmitted securely. This includes use of TLS / SSL protocols, 256-bit AES encryption, API call-level authentication, third-party penetration testing and code review, and district and application-specific OAuth 2.0 API Bearer Tokens with over 200 bits of entropy. Once a district authorizes and adopts Clever, in adherence to FERPA and our own data confidentiality agreement, Clever will never re-disclose student information to third parties unless explicitly authorized by the district. Districts may, at any time, revoke any third party s access to student information or terminate their relationship with Clever by providing written notice. Within 72 hours of receipt of notice of termination, Clever shall delete the district s account and destroy any stored student information. For more information on Clever s security practices, please review Clever s Security Whitepaper or our security team. Clever saved me many, many hours - so I can actually get into the classroom to assist teachers instead of staying in my office. Rebecca King, Director of Teaching and Learning, Rockdale ISD 2013 Clever, Inc. All Rights Reserved. 5

6 Clever School District White Paper REAL WORLD BENEFITS Integrating applications via Clever provides considerable benefits to districts. Below is a detailed description of three such benefits as shared by other districts: Current Data in All Applications: The IT administrator of a top-20 district shared that before Clever, out-of-date student rosters had become a top source of teacher frustration. All too frequently, computer lab sessions were derailed because new students were missing accounts - or because existing accounts did not reflect recent class changes. Keeping data up to date across all applications was critical to providing a seamless experience for the students. The administrator set up Clever for free, and convinced his vendors to integrate with the Clever APIs. His students have enjoyed up-to-date classroom software ever since. Ease of Adopting More Software: Several districts using Clever have decided to pilot Blended Learning programs in specific schools, whereby teachers will blend computer-based online learning with traditional instruction. Such deployments often involve setting up 5-15 new online learning providers, all of which require recurrent roster updates. Before Clever, one district reported that this had become a multimonth project requiring hours every week of frustrating manual updating. With Clever, provisioning accounts in a dozen applications takes just minutes - and the accounts always stay accurate and up-to-date. Software that Just Works: A principal of a top-20 district high school watched her teachers and students waste hundreds of hours manually updating their user accounts in a leading online learning application, only to repeat the process again each year. Clever solves this problem by automating the entire account creation and updating process, letting your students and teachers begin learning the moment they turn on the computer. Districts only have to set up their Clever account once; from there, the reliability, security, and permanence of their Clever integration helps teachers learn to trust that online learning software will just work when they need it Clever, Inc. All Rights Reserved. 6

7 Clever School District White Paper Return on Investment & Efficiencies Manual SFTP Clever Manual Manually rostering students in vendors applications SFTP Sending student rosters to vendors by SFTP Clever 5-15 hrs (per school/ app) for school employees to correctly format and input roster data once at beginning of year. 2-3 wks (per app) for district system engineers to correctly export student data to vendor, validate data. One time set-up Pull Option = 5 min Push Option = 1 day 9 hrs (15 min/wk x36 wk) for school employees (often teachers) to make roster changes. Can delay implementation of purchased software by weeks or months. Less than 5 min to begin syncing data with each new application. Estimated Setup Costs 5-15 hours per school x $60/h per fully loaded employee x each application = $300 - $750 /school/ app Estimated Support Costs 9 hrs per school x $60/h per employee x each application = $540 /school/app Estimated Setup Costs hours per district x each application = thousands of setup hours over the course of each year, must be repeated for application upgrades and/or new data requirements Estimated Support Costs Vary widely depending on SIS and vendor. Becomes necessary every time access for a teacher or student fails Estimated Setup Costs One-time 5 min setup process, if the district selects the automatic sync option = Negligible Estimated Support Costs Clever is an automated sync that runs on its own, never requiring direct intervention from the district = Negligible New Applications New Applications New Applications = hours, each 2013 Clever, Inc. All Rights Reserved. If Clever compatible, 7 = $840 - $1,290 each + + significant support 3 min / app hundreds of headaches costs + hundreds of headaches = Negligible

8 Clever School District White Paper OVER 100 APPLICATIONS USE CLEVER Today, over 100 applications have licensed the Clever technology and built it into their products. Using Clever helps them reduce their support costs and greatly improves their customers experience. These applications include: NWEA - Leading interim and formative assessment provider Scholastic - Curriculum, adaptive reading and math, and assessment DreamBox Learning Adaptive elementary math Achieve Differentiated online instruction Google Apps for Education , docs, storage Learning.com Online instruction and diagnostics Imagine Learning Language and literacy instruction MasteryConnect Formative assessment MyBigCampus by Lightspeed Systems Student learning community myon Reader by Capstone Digital Adaptive online reading Power My Learning by CFY Free online learning activities Think Through Math Adaptive math instruction And over 90 others. To inquire if your learning software already supports Clever, or is planning support, contact support@clever.com with a list of the software used in your district. CLEVER FOR GOOGLE APPS Clever provides districts with a painless, completely free integration between the student information system and Google Apps for Education. This means that students added or removed from the student information system are automatically provisioned and de-provisioned within Google Apps. For more information about enabling this free service, please contact support@clever.com. MAKING YOUR APPS CLEVER COMPATIBLE Districts who use software not already supported by Clever have had great success asking their vendors to build in support. If your application is not compatible with Clever, your vendor and CC bd@clever.com. From there, the Clever team will work with your vendor to help them build Clever support into their product. HELPING TO ALIGN YOUR DATA WAREHOUSE Clever is a one way data bridge - sending data from the SIS to your applications. Some of your applications, though, may already be sending learning data back to you, and perhaps you are storing it in a data warehouse. Clever offers substantial benefits here as well. By using Clever, you ensure the accuracy and relevance of the learning data you are receiving from your applications. As Clever automatically 2013 Clever, Inc. All Rights Reserved. 8

9 Clever School District White Paper updates each application, this clean data will flow into your warehouse via the data connections you have already established. Student and teacher names, ID numbers, and classroom assignments remain timely and consistent across your systems, saving you weeks of cleaning and validation - and making your data instantly usable. Using Clever DATA SCOPING Clever allows districts to send each vendor precisely the information they need and nothing more. Once a district authorizes a vendor to begin receiving data through Clever, the district must scope the sync within the Clever Dashboard web interface. For example, the Clever Dashboard allows districts to send data on all of their students to a vendor, or to limit the scope to only include certain schools or certain classes. There is no way for vendors to bypass this authorization mechanism under any circumstances, ensuring full district control at all times Clever, Inc. All Rights Reserved. 9

10 Clever School District White Paper ENSURING DATA INTEGRITY Clever provides districts with multiple ways to ensure their data integrity. A data browser lets district users review all data that is being sent to vendors in student-bystudent detail in an easy-to-use interactive display. Additionally, Clever automatically reviews all data it receives with hundreds of algorithms that check for missing fields or other data issues. Clever flags data warnings and allows districts to download a list of issues so that the data can be properly updated in the source SIS. Using Clever s feedback to improve the integrity of data in the source SIS has the added benefit of ensuring that vendors are using a consistent set of updated student identifiers essential for receiving learning data from vendors that can be aggregated for reporting. COMING SOON: SECURE SINGLE SIGN-ON Districts looking to offer their students an easy method for Single Sign-On (SSO) into various applications will be able to use the upcoming Clever SSO interface at zero cost to the district. The Clever SSO interface offers picture-password options for younger students, a traditional username and password for older students, and secure SAML integration for ADFS 2.0 and GAFE credential stores. One logged in, students can access and instantly begin using all of their software from a single user-friendly dashboard. For more information about the forthcoming Clever SSO, please contact support@clever.com. Conclusion The Clever technology was engineered from the ground-up to make it easier for districts to deploy and manage third party educational software, with careful attention paid to districts unique security and control requirements. As a result, the Clever technology today helps thousands of schools and districts ensure that their software just works. To sign up for Clever and get started today, simply go to: For more information about Clever, please contact support@clever.com 140 Second Street 4th Floor San Francisco, CA Clever, Inc. All Rights Reserved. 10