New central computer will save money, time
The district is embarking on a three-year replacement of its central computer system that is changing a dinosaur into a whole new animal.
By making district functions more automated, timely and integrated, the odyssey project is expected to save the district millions of dollars and make life a little easier for all employees.
Payroll, human resources and finance departments are the first to undergo change, but systems also will be replaced in nutrition services, student information, transportation, facilities and asset management, risk management and the warehouse. The project is funded by long-term loans.
The current computer system dates from the early 1970's. Currently, district systems are paper-intensive and slow. Information from one department can't easily be related to data from another department.
The current system's capacity also is very limited, for example, it holds just one year of financial information. That means the only way the finance department can compare data from 1998 and 1999 is to produce hard copy reports and evaluate them manually.
By contrast, the new system will have greater capacity and allow sharing of information. It also will make more information available online, and reduce the turnaround time needed to access it, according to Chief Technology Officer Manny Ovena. "The new system will allow us to enter information once, then that information will be integrated throughout the system. Information will be more accurate because it will be consistent."
The new system also will enable employees to perform many routine functions online, from entering personnel data to filing a purchase order requisition. This will eliminate the paperwork that often got lost or delayed as it traveled from desk to desk and through the mail in the old system.
Changes in the way we do business from recording student test scores, to ordering art supplies, to keeping track of the canned tomatoes used by the Central Kitchen will require some learning and adaptation by employees, Ovena cautions.
The district selected a "vanilla" implementation of PeopleSoft, the operating software for the new system. That means minimal modifications will be made to the applications' underlying programming. In many cases, the result will be a change in district business procedures, says Claudia Peabody, Odyssey project coordinator. "When we implement PeopleSoft, we are getting proven best practices," she said.
A maintenance agreement ensures upgrades every 18 months, "so we'll never be stuck with a 20-year-old system again," Ovena says.
A series of brown-bag lunches in the BESC Board Auditorium will offer sneak previews of the system and how it works. Watch for more information to come or check the PPS website.
(From ConnectED/Oct 1999)
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