AISD administrators said the software program called TEAMS was selected from a group of five offered by bidding companies to handle budgeting needs, human resources requirements and the drastic changes coming to student data as Texas transitions from the Public Education Information Management System to the Texas Student Data System, a switch requiring more information to be provided to the Texas Education Agency.
Melissa Irby, the district’s executive director of finance, said the contract is still being negotiated but the program itself, plus training and other optional needs, would be roughly $1.8 to $1.9 million total.
“One of the things we were discussing is we would like to spread that contract amount over a five-year term so it’ll have minimum fund balance impact over the time of the contract,” Irby said.
If negotiations are successful, Irby said, the district would purchase training for $100,000 and pay a first installment to the company for the software, which would be about $160,000. Additional costs, including the purchase of new time clocks to replace outdated models, also would come out of the district’s fund balance.
A second installment, Irby said, would come out in September 2016, which is next fiscal year and could be budgeted.
Identifying the district’s choice program involved three on-site visits to see various programs in use and three demonstrations for district personnel from different companies.
In the process, the team tasked with identifying the best choice considered splitting up the programs between student data and finance/HR. But Superintendent David Young said Monday the incompatibility would be too difficult to overcome, as it would be difficult to have the two functions work well together, he said.
School board President Danny Wheat said the process was handled well and the district’s team performed admirably.
“I think as far as the board is concerned, the ability of that system to be accessible was important and they had talked earlier about splitting the system up and having two parts and how compatible that really was,” he said. “And there was concern about that compatibility and there was still some at the end, so we asked them to go back and look. I think the decision was diligent and a well-thought-out process.”
©2015 the Abilene Reporter-News (Abilene, Texas) Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.