Data Harmony: Integrating Systems, Empowering Schools
This episode delves into the intricacies of data management within independent schools (with a focus on OneRoster) and explores solutions to support tech leaders. The speakers emphasize the critical role of data integration in achieving efficiency and improved outcomes. They also highlight the benefits of OneRoster in streamlining data sharing across various systems. Additionally, the conversation underscores the importance of prioritizing data security and privacy to safeguard sensitive student information.
- OneRoster - a standard for securely and reliably exchanging roster information, course materials, and grades between systems, developed and maintained by 1EdTech
- Learning Tools Interoperability (LTI) - another standard developed by 1EdTech, used to connect learning tools with an institution's learning environment without logging into each tool
- 1EdTech - nonprofit committed to building an open, trusted, and innovative digital learning ecosystem
- Blackbaud
- K-12 Schools Software
- Calvert Hall College High School Realizes Efficiencies with OneRoster and LTI Integrations - Customer Story
- Veracross
- Veracross 360 - school management platform
- API Plus for Academics - enables integration between the Veracross platform and a broad range of educational software providers using the industry data standard known as "OneRoster"
- Taping a cat to a wall
Transcript
Peter Frank 00:00:02
Phil, welcome to Talking Technology with ATLIS,
Peter Frank 00:00:05
the show that plugs you into the important topics and trends for
Peter Frank 00:00:08
technology leaders all through a unique Independent School lens.
Peter Frank 00:00:12
We'll hear stories from technology directors and other
Peter Frank 00:00:15
special guests from the Independent School community,
Peter Frank 00:00:17
and provide you with focused learning and deep dive topics.
Peter Frank 00:00:21
And now please welcome your host. Kristina Lewellen,
Christina Lewellen 00:00:25
Hello everyone, and welcome back to
Christina Lewellen 00:00:27
talking technology with Atlas. I'm Kristina Lewellen, the
Christina Lewellen 00:00:29
executive director of the Association of Technology
Christina Lewellen 00:00:32
Leaders in Independent Schools.
Bill Stites 00:00:34
And I am Bill Stites, the Director of
Bill Stites 00:00:36
Technology at Montclair Kimberly Academy in Montclair, New
Bill Stites 00:00:39
Jersey. And
Hiram Cuevas 00:00:40
I'm Hiram Cuevas, Director of Information Systems
Hiram Cuevas 00:00:42
and Academic Technology at St Christopher school in Richmond,
Hiram Cuevas 00:00:45
Virginia.
Christina Lewellen 00:00:46
Hello, gentlemen. How are you today?
Christina Lewellen 00:00:48
Little chilly this morning. It
Bill Stites 00:00:49
is. I walked outside and I thought the same.
Bill Stites 00:00:51
I was like, wow, it's getting cold.
Christina Lewellen 00:00:54
I have a chihuahua mix that we adopted a
Christina Lewellen 00:00:58
while back, and that dog does not vibe with the cold weather.
Christina Lewellen 00:01:01
So I was dropping into the Atlas team slack. We have a channel
Christina Lewellen 00:01:05
set up for kids and pets. And today the Chihuahua took center
Christina Lewellen 00:01:10
stage because she was bundled in the blankets. She was not having
Christina Lewellen 00:01:14
it with this weather. Yeah, Bill's
Hiram Cuevas 00:01:15
dog has no issue with this weather.
Bill Stites 00:01:17
No, I have 140 pound long haired limb burger.
Bill Stites 00:01:22
She prefers to be outside. I often laugh, because when
Bill Stites 00:01:26
everyone's like during the winters, make sure you don't
Bill Stites 00:01:28
leave your dogs outside too long. You need to think of your
Bill Stites 00:01:31
animals. My dogs like I'm laying out here it's cold, and when
Bill Stites 00:01:34
there's snow, she's submarine under that thing. We can't get
Bill Stites 00:01:37
her in, let alone worry about her getting too cold.
Christina Lewellen 00:01:41
Yeah, this is exactly the deal with a
Christina Lewellen 00:01:44
staffer, an atlas staffer, Kelsea Watson, has a husky, and
Christina Lewellen 00:01:48
that dog will sit out in the backyard and just look in at her
Christina Lewellen 00:01:52
parents as James and Kelsea are trying to call her in, she's
Christina Lewellen 00:01:55
like, Yeah, no, I'll come in when I decide.
Hiram Cuevas 00:01:58
You know, we have a black lab, who's about 92
Hiram Cuevas 00:02:01
pounds. And right now, anytime there's water and cold, that's
Hiram Cuevas 00:02:06
one happy pup. Oh
Christina Lewellen 00:02:07
my gosh, this is cool. We've never talked
Christina Lewellen 00:02:09
about animals before. That was fun. I love this. Well, I'm
Christina Lewellen 00:02:12
bringing you guys together today on a technical topic, and we
Christina Lewellen 00:02:16
deep dive into things. Every once in a while, we did one a
Christina Lewellen 00:02:19
while back on APIs, and not long ago, Hiram and Bill, you guys
Christina Lewellen 00:02:23
were talking about data and data sharing across platforms, and
Christina Lewellen 00:02:28
why that ends up being kind of a headache for technology leaders
Christina Lewellen 00:02:32
at our schools. What I find really interesting is that you
Christina Lewellen 00:02:36
each at your schools represent a different major sis player in
Christina Lewellen 00:02:40
our market, Hiram, you're a Blackbaud school. Bill, you're a
Christina Lewellen 00:02:44
Veracross school. And those are the two loves of our lives here
Christina Lewellen 00:02:47
in the Independent School world. And what's really cool is that
Christina Lewellen 00:02:50
we're going to have a conversation with a
Christina Lewellen 00:02:52
representative from each of those companies today on the
Christina Lewellen 00:02:55
pod. So this is kind of exciting, but before we welcome
Christina Lewellen 00:02:58
them in as guests, I wanted to at least just stop for a second
Christina Lewellen 00:03:02
and have you guys explain sort of where this came from. You
Christina Lewellen 00:03:05
both came to me with this idea you wanted to have a
Christina Lewellen 00:03:07
conversation around one roster and data woes as you're
Christina Lewellen 00:03:11
wrestling them. So tell our audience why you wanted to have
Christina Lewellen 00:03:15
this conversation. I think the
Hiram Cuevas 00:03:16
interesting thing is, there's so many wonderful
Hiram Cuevas 00:03:18
resources that are being created right now that I look at some of
Hiram Cuevas 00:03:23
the textbooks and some of the ancillary materials that are in
Hiram Cuevas 00:03:25
textbooks, and then you sit there like, okay, so they've got
Hiram Cuevas 00:03:28
quizzes built in, they've got lab activities built in, they've
Hiram Cuevas 00:03:31
got problem sets built in, but how do I get this information
Hiram Cuevas 00:03:35
from my sis to that platform and then Bill and I would be like,
Hiram Cuevas 00:03:40
Well, how do You get that information, then back into your
Hiram Cuevas 00:03:42
grade books? So this was a conundrum for us, because we
Hiram Cuevas 00:03:46
were creating these micro silos of information that our teachers
Hiram Cuevas 00:03:51
desperately needed to have within the SIS so that they
Hiram Cuevas 00:03:54
could leverage all of the functionalities of their
Unknown 00:03:57
SIS programs. So like,
Christina Lewellen 00:03:59
the tool is super cool. But then the tech
Christina Lewellen 00:04:03
leader has to come in and say, Yeah, but how are we going to
Christina Lewellen 00:04:05
get it back in the SAS, right? So you guys are like,
Bill Stites 00:04:09
I mean, I remember, it was a few conferences ago, a
Bill Stites 00:04:12
bunch of us sitting in a room together and saying, you know,
Bill Stites 00:04:15
we really need to start pressuring our vendors to be
Bill Stites 00:04:19
able to have data go back and forth a lot easier than what
Bill Stites 00:04:24
it's currently doing. Everyone offers something, and we'll get
Bill Stites 00:04:27
into what those options are, you know, keep it at a high level
Bill Stites 00:04:30
before we get a little deeper. But every company's got, like,
Bill Stites 00:04:33
an option for getting data out and data in, but it's all ad
Bill Stites 00:04:37
hoc, and having something where you've got a standard that you
Bill Stites 00:04:42
can point to so you're not having to pivot and change and
Bill Stites 00:04:46
develop for every single vendor that you work on was really
Bill Stites 00:04:49
something that has risen to the top, as far as like a need or a
Bill Stites 00:04:53
must have, even for schools like ours, and that's where our
Bill Stites 00:04:56
guests can come in and speak to a lot of that work right now.
Hiram Cuevas 00:04:59
Yeah. And Kristina. What's also
Hiram Cuevas 00:05:01
interesting is when your data map matures for your
Hiram Cuevas 00:05:05
institution, and now you start looking at the connections to
Hiram Cuevas 00:05:09
some of your ed tech materials, and you notice that the
Hiram Cuevas 00:05:12
directions are unidirectional versus bi directional. That
Hiram Cuevas 00:05:15
really gets the attention of senior leadership, because all
Hiram Cuevas 00:05:18
of a sudden they're starting to recognize, okay, we have
Hiram Cuevas 00:05:21
problems here. We're developing silos. We have asynchronous
Hiram Cuevas 00:05:24
information that could potentially result and if you
Hiram Cuevas 00:05:27
were to look at Bill's data map, his is color coded, and any
Hiram Cuevas 00:05:31
lines that show that they're black, that means that they're
Hiram Cuevas 00:05:33
man, they're manual transfers of data. You want to eliminate as
Hiram Cuevas 00:05:36
many manual transfers of data as possible. Well,
Christina Lewellen 00:05:40
that sounds like a really good setup to
Christina Lewellen 00:05:42
welcome our guests for this technical, deep dive that we're
Christina Lewellen 00:05:45
going into today. First, I want to welcome Steven Boyle, who is
Christina Lewellen 00:05:49
the Senior Product Manager at Blackbaud. We are also welcoming
Christina Lewellen 00:05:53
to the pod Thad white and Thad is the Director of Product
Christina Lewellen 00:05:56
Management at Veracross. Gentlemen, thank you so much for
Christina Lewellen 00:06:00
joining us today for this conversation, before we get into
Christina Lewellen 00:06:03
the topic at hand, I'm hoping that you could just take a quick
Christina Lewellen 00:06:06
minute and introduce yourselves to our community. Steven, why
Christina Lewellen 00:06:10
don't we go to you? You're with Blackbaud. How long have you
Christina Lewellen 00:06:13
been there? And tell us a little bit about yourself. Yeah,
Stephen Boyle 00:06:16
lovely to be here. I've been at Blackbaud for
Stephen Boyle 00:06:19
28 years now. Kind of a unicorn for the technology company. I'm
Stephen Boyle 00:06:23
a product manager, and kind of unicorn there too. I started out
Stephen Boyle 00:06:27
as a software developer, and so my journey through, through my
Stephen Boyle 00:06:31
career as software developer to UX designer to researcher and
Stephen Boyle 00:06:36
now product manager, and I'm a product manager of our APIs and
Stephen Boyle 00:06:41
integrations and one rush jerseys in that portfolio. So my
Stephen Boyle 00:06:46
technical background helps a lot in being able to bridge the
Stephen Boyle 00:06:49
divide. Heard the guys talking about their data map and
Stephen Boyle 00:06:54
problems and how they go to the vendors. That's how these kind
Stephen Boyle 00:06:57
of topics present, right? They present in a we've got this
Stephen Boyle 00:07:01
problem, and we need you to solve it, and it becomes
Stephen Boyle 00:07:04
incumbent on us to jump in. But I really like diving into these
Stephen Boyle 00:07:07
tech details. I
Christina Lewellen 00:07:09
love it sounds like you're the perfect
Christina Lewellen 00:07:10
guest for us. And Thad tell us a little bit about your background
Christina Lewellen 00:07:13
and how long you've been with Veracross. Absolutely.
Thad White 00:07:16
Hello, everyone. Excited to be here. I am the
Thad White 00:07:19
Director of Product Management at Veracross for academics and
Thad White 00:07:23
admissions. I've been with Veracross Coming up on seven
Thad White 00:07:25
years now, and in that time various roles in product but
Thad White 00:07:30
started as an account manager, and prior to that, implemented
Thad White 00:07:35
Veracross at Culver Academy. So shout out to all my Culver
Thad White 00:07:38
Academy's family. I haven't seen you all in a long time, but
Thad White 00:07:41
excited to just continue to provide value here. But yeah,
Thad White 00:07:45
excellent topic. Really excited to get out in the weeds
Christina Lewellen 00:07:48
with it. Awesome. So before I let the
Christina Lewellen 00:07:49
guys take over with their detailed tech questions, I'm the
Christina Lewellen 00:07:52
non techie person on this pod, so I would love to ask you guys
Christina Lewellen 00:07:57
to explain to me what it is we're talking about in terms of,
Christina Lewellen 00:08:02
okay? So we said one roster, and that is kind of the standard
Christina Lewellen 00:08:06
that has been designed and developed by one ed tech, a
Christina Lewellen 00:08:09
company that basically says we need to kind of standardize how
Christina Lewellen 00:08:13
data flows, right? So I'm hoping that you can explain that, or if
Christina Lewellen 00:08:17
I've gotten that wrong, help me and help our audience
Christina Lewellen 00:08:19
understand, especially those who maybe are listening in as
Christina Lewellen 00:08:22
leadership, or folks who are not deep into the IT side, but maybe
Christina Lewellen 00:08:26
more on the Ed Tech side. Why does this matter? What is it and
Christina Lewellen 00:08:29
why even have this conversation
Stephen Boyle 00:08:32
the way it presents to us, the way the
Stephen Boyle 00:08:35
problem comes to us is, I've got this silo, I've got this manual
Stephen Boyle 00:08:39
process. I want to use this tool, but I can't put another
Stephen Boyle 00:08:44
task on my teachers. I can't give them another log in. I
Stephen Boyle 00:08:47
can't have this data just be abandoned somewhere. And so when
Stephen Boyle 00:08:52
we hear that type of problem, the answer is an integration of
Stephen Boyle 00:08:55
some kind, especially that and I both are an si s, a student
Stephen Boyle 00:08:59
information system where schools want the source of truth to
Stephen Boyle 00:09:04
reside, so they want that information to flow back and
Stephen Boyle 00:09:07
forth, one roster enters the picture to solve, originally, a
Stephen Boyle 00:09:12
specific problem of connecting that learning management
Stephen Boyle 00:09:16
situation to all the tools that These teachers want to use,
Stephen Boyle 00:09:21
providing a way to present rosters and students and
Stephen Boyle 00:09:24
teachers information such that there isn't manual entry,
Stephen Boyle 00:09:28
there's no data error because of double entry, and then getting
Stephen Boyle 00:09:32
that data back. Once again, you don't want double entry, and you
Stephen Boyle 00:09:35
don't want the teacher to have that extra task of doing some
Stephen Boyle 00:09:40
additional step you want to remove the friction, you want to
Stephen Boyle 00:09:44
prevent the data errors, and that's where one roster comes
Stephen Boyle 00:09:47
in. They built a standard. It's not a product. They built a
Stephen Boyle 00:09:50
standard, sort of a rule set that everybody agrees to abide
Stephen Boyle 00:09:53
by, so that when we talk to each other, we know what information
Stephen Boyle 00:09:57
we're getting and we know what information we have to give. It
Stephen Boyle 00:10:00
in order to solve the problem. So,
Christina Lewellen 00:10:02
Steven, before we started this call, you
Christina Lewellen 00:10:04
kind of made the analogy that it's almost like a USB, a USB
Christina Lewellen 00:10:07
cord, or whatever. They all fit in the same box. So we have to
Christina Lewellen 00:10:11
agree somewhere what a USB looks like. Yeah,
Stephen Boyle 00:10:13
all the different companies agreed to put this
Stephen Boyle 00:10:16
plug on our machines and all the device can we agree to support
Stephen Boyle 00:10:20
the data that comes through the plug and all the different power
Stephen Boyle 00:10:24
rules, so they don't have to talk to each other. All they
Stephen Boyle 00:10:27
have to do is read the standard and know that if I present my
Stephen Boyle 00:10:31
system such that it adopts a standard that everybody can work
Stephen Boyle 00:10:35
with me, that's the gold standard. That's what they're
Stephen Boyle 00:10:38
trying to achieve, the Holy Grail, I guess. And it has its
Stephen Boyle 00:10:41
benefits. There definitely are places where we can talk about
Stephen Boyle 00:10:44
the gaps. Is every standard USB wouldn't have evolved if it was
Stephen Boyle 00:10:49
perfect the first time. Same thing is true for one roster. So
Stephen Boyle 00:10:53
then
Christina Lewellen 00:10:53
Thad, let me ask you this, whether you're
Christina Lewellen 00:10:55
with Veracross or Blackbaud or another system, was this a
Christina Lewellen 00:10:58
welcome standard for folks like you that are offering sis
Christina Lewellen 00:11:03
systems in terms of a solution to this problem?
Thad White 00:11:06
Yeah, absolutely. And I think, echoing what
Thad White 00:11:08
Steven's already said, the core problem we're presented with is
Thad White 00:11:12
our schools, globally, all over the place, have individual
Thad White 00:11:16
ecosystems of software that they use. Right? There's no one tool
Thad White 00:11:19
to rule them all. And so everybody's got these various
Thad White 00:11:22
vendors, hundreds of them, and the SIS goal is to provide them
Thad White 00:11:27
support and to enable them to use that ecosystem, official,
Thad White 00:11:31
right? And so things like one roster, these standards where we
Thad White 00:11:34
can say, okay, the bar for what it takes for us to be able to
Thad White 00:11:38
integrate with XYZ vendor is now substantially lower because we
Thad White 00:11:42
know we're speaking the same language. We've established it
Thad White 00:11:45
is one roster. There's no drastic and huge process to
Thad White 00:11:48
understand well, we call it this, and we structure the data
Thad White 00:11:51
this way. What do you do? Like that interpretation that has to
Thad White 00:11:55
happen when you're building a partnership and a true like
Thad White 00:11:57
direct integration, significantly less effort on
Thad White 00:12:00
both sides when we have an established standard to align
Thad White 00:12:04
with. So we can say we speak one roster. Do you great? Okay, so
Thad White 00:12:08
we can get to usability, or at least testability, very, very
Thad White 00:12:12
rapidly. So that's hugely impactful for us. And so as we
Thad White 00:12:17
identify more and more key vendors and they align with the
Thad White 00:12:19
standard, it just the market itself comes up as far as
Thad White 00:12:24
interoperability and how easy that is for both schools and the
Thad White 00:12:28
vendors themselves, our management is significantly
Thad White 00:12:30
lower, because instead of managing eight direct
Thad White 00:12:34
integrations, custom integrations, with vendors, now
Thad White 00:12:37
we're managing a platform, a language for managing Those one
Thad White 00:12:40
will get you many with regard to the effort put into that so
Thad White 00:12:45
hugely impactful for us, things like one roster.
Bill Stites 00:12:48
Whenever you talk to a vendor about how you can
Bill Stites 00:12:50
manage data, they will talk about, really, what I'll say is
Bill Stites 00:12:53
three things. They'll talk about, oh yeah. We can give you
Bill Stites 00:12:56
a CSV, you know, a basic spreadsheet, comma separated
Bill Stites 00:12:59
sheet with these things. Or they'll talk about, oh, yeah,
Bill Stites 00:13:02
that'll work. We have an SFTP server, secure file transfer
Bill Stites 00:13:06
server. Or they'll talk about their API, and like, oh, we have
Bill Stites 00:13:09
an open API. And you'll get into all sorts of conversations about
Bill Stites 00:13:13
APIs. We have another podcast on that. But those are what a
Bill Stites 00:13:17
vendor, a product might sell you on. Is this open ability to get
Bill Stites 00:13:22
at your data. Why is one roster better than what's come
Stephen Boyle 00:13:27
before it? I think that the idea of a
Stephen Boyle 00:13:30
standard and it being agreed upon by everyone, what it
Stephen Boyle 00:13:33
eliminates on both sides, the SIS and the school and the
Stephen Boyle 00:13:37
solution, it eliminates the requirement that the school go
Stephen Boyle 00:13:41
to their vendor and convince them to have a proprietary
Stephen Boyle 00:13:45
direct integration for each of the tools they use. And then it
Stephen Boyle 00:13:49
takes the burden, a lot of the burden, let me not say the whole
Stephen Boyle 00:13:51
burden, but it takes a lot of the burden off of the CIS to
Stephen Boyle 00:13:55
provide one integration that all the tools can use, instead of
Stephen Boyle 00:13:59
having to do a production cycle for every tool they want to
Stephen Boyle 00:14:03
support, so it's faster to market. It's easier to convince
Stephen Boyle 00:14:08
a partner when the lift is smaller. That's really what it's
Stephen Boyle 00:14:11
doing. It's allowing the SAS vendor to solve problems for
Stephen Boyle 00:14:15
numerous tools all at once. It's allowing the school to have an
Stephen Boyle 00:14:19
easier conversation with their vendor to provide that access to
Stephen Boyle 00:14:23
the tools they want to use to solve their school specific
Stephen Boyle 00:14:27
ecosystem of problems. So that's what I think the real what did
Stephen Boyle 00:14:30
it replace kind of answer is, is it replaced that burden of
Stephen Boyle 00:14:35
convincing all of your business partners to spend all of this
Stephen Boyle 00:14:38
time building something specific when they can build something
Stephen Boyle 00:14:41
that everybody can start
Thad White 00:14:43
on Absolutely, I'll echo what you just said there. I
Thad White 00:14:46
think what we've seen on the ver cross side is it creates
Thad White 00:14:49
opportunities that otherwise would have been difficult to
Thad White 00:14:52
maneuver. So in the case of some large partners, let's say
Thad White 00:14:57
massive companies, perhaps working with. US is not on their
Thad White 00:15:01
top priority list. And so a lot of them, it would seem, have
Thad White 00:15:04
aligned with standards to say, we just work with the standard
Thad White 00:15:06
you align with that we can cover everybody, and we're not having
Thad White 00:15:10
to talk to each and every vendor, because they've got
Thad White 00:15:12
1000s of us reaching out, right? And so plugging into that has
Thad White 00:15:16
opened up conversations and opportunities to be able to
Thad White 00:15:20
integrate with other vendors in a way that is collaborative, in
Thad White 00:15:24
a true partnership, rather than and Bill, you've seen this on
Thad White 00:15:27
the Veracross side historically, perhaps building custom
Thad White 00:15:30
integrations from the si s side that the other vendor may not
Thad White 00:15:34
even be aware exists, right? And so yes, we integrate with this
Thad White 00:15:37
vendor. Different from Yeah, we speak the same language as this
Thad White 00:15:41
vendor. We have a way to talk about and build bi directional
Thad White 00:15:44
support for you the school from both sides. So those things, I
Thad White 00:15:49
think one roster is really helpful with regard to just that
Thad White 00:15:53
partnership with vendors who otherwise might not have time or
Thad White 00:15:57
resources to devote to each and every one of us as Ed Tech
Thad White 00:16:00
vendors.
Hiram Cuevas 00:16:01
So sad you mentioned the term language. And
Hiram Cuevas 00:16:04
what's interesting is what we've been trying to avoid, I think,
Hiram Cuevas 00:16:07
with one roster, is developing these dialects for each of these
Hiram Cuevas 00:16:11
software companies more than anything else. And so it's bad
Hiram Cuevas 00:16:14
enough that we've got to understand New Jersey speak,
Bill Stites 00:16:20
right bill, stop, stop.
Hiram Cuevas 00:16:23
So how would this avoid the issues with, say, a
Hiram Cuevas 00:16:27
hub or a middleware solution that some schools are deploying?
Hiram Cuevas 00:16:32
Yeah,
Thad White 00:16:32
that's a good question. Obviously, the more
Thad White 00:16:34
links in the chain, the more complicated it is to find the
Thad White 00:16:38
issue right. And so anytime we're talking about a middleware
Thad White 00:16:40
solution. The answer, I'm thinking about the support
Thad White 00:16:44
perspective, right? Something goes wrong. You reach out to
Thad White 00:16:46
support on either vendor side, and they go, Well, it's this
Thad White 00:16:48
guy's problem. No, it's this person's problem. And so you get
Thad White 00:16:51
kind of that man in the middle syndrome for a lot of these
Thad White 00:16:54
especially when we're talking about middleware, not to say
Thad White 00:16:56
that middleware doesn't have a value. There are certainly value
Thad White 00:16:59
to that. We've listed some of them out in what we've talked
Thad White 00:17:01
about. But I think with regard to this, things like to get into
Thad White 00:17:06
the nitty gritty, the source ID concept, which, in one roster,
Thad White 00:17:10
is a sort of a UU ID concept that says we're referring to
Thad White 00:17:14
these objects. Here is the identifier. I don't care what
Thad White 00:17:17
Veracross ID for this thing is. I don't care what Canvas ID for
Thad White 00:17:20
this thing is everybody talking about with us, about these
Thad White 00:17:24
objects is using this string. We're in agreement, that's how
Thad White 00:17:28
we're referring to it. So a number of these technical
Thad White 00:17:31
aspects built into the standard really facilitate faster. What
Thad White 00:17:36
thing are you actually talking about? Vendor B versus
Thad White 00:17:39
Veracross. Vendor a right and allows us to present tooling to
Thad White 00:17:43
the schools to sort of self service, a lot of that, being
Thad White 00:17:46
able to go in and go, Oh, I see there's a problem with this
Thad White 00:17:49
person's class. What's the corresponding class in my LMS
Thad White 00:17:52
vendor, using some of those aspects built into the standard
Thad White 00:17:55
really allows the school to play a larger role in understanding
Thad White 00:17:59
what's happening and why? Whereas in a middleware, you're
Thad White 00:18:02
really getting obfuscation about well, it was sent over here and
Thad White 00:18:06
then they manipulated and sent over here, you get lost in that
Thad White 00:18:09
process. And so for me, I think one roster is the shared
Thad White 00:18:13
language middleware, if you will, really enables the school
Thad White 00:18:16
side personnel to have a better understanding of what's going on
Thad White 00:18:20
and exchange of information between the
Bill Stites 00:18:22
systems. One of the things I would add to that is,
Bill Stites 00:18:26
in terms of the links in the chain, I think are a great
Bill Stites 00:18:29
thing. And I'll be even more blunt about it, you know,
Bill Stites 00:18:32
middleware comes at a cost, and it's an additional cost that the
Bill Stites 00:18:35
school needs to take on in order to make that work. So if you're
Bill Stites 00:18:38
working with vendor a and vendor B, and they're saying, we need
Bill Stites 00:18:42
this piece in the middle to connect the two that are going
Bill Stites 00:18:45
to bring things together. That's a cost, that's me
Bill Stites 00:18:48
troubleshooting and supporting. And one of the interesting
Bill Stites 00:18:50
things that I'll point out with that is a real example we had
Bill Stites 00:18:53
when we were going down that route with one of these tools,
Bill Stites 00:18:57
was they opened it up and they said, All right, we're going to
Bill Stites 00:19:00
try to connect this. We need these data points just give us
Bill Stites 00:19:03
an access to all these scopes. And I'm like, Why? Why do you
Bill Stites 00:19:07
need that much information? Like you need to tell me what you
Bill Stites 00:19:11
want, because you're telling me to give you all the scopes
Bill Stites 00:19:14
associated with academics. And I was like, No. And when you need
Bill Stites 00:19:18
to think about like, how we secure our own data and where
Bill Stites 00:19:21
that goes. You know, you need to better define what it is you
Bill Stites 00:19:25
need. You need to look into what the in this case, the Veracross
Bill Stites 00:19:29
API, or even the Blackboard API, is saying that they're
Bill Stites 00:19:32
delivering. And you need to be very explicit about what are you
Bill Stites 00:19:35
going to take? Because that's opening up a can of worms when
Bill Stites 00:19:39
it comes to who's got access to the data, that is just a huge
Bill Stites 00:19:43
red flag for what we're dealing with as schools in the day to
Bill Stites 00:19:47
day, the vetting conversations that we've had, you know, the
Bill Stites 00:19:49
access to data, all of those things, and the one roster helps
Bill Stites 00:19:53
that immensely. So my
Christina Lewellen 00:19:56
question, then, for Steven and Thad, do
Christina Lewellen 00:19:59
you guys have some. Examples, you know, Hiram mentioned the
Christina Lewellen 00:20:02
textbook thing with grading mechanisms, and Bill is talking
Christina Lewellen 00:20:06
about like, hey, you know, I would love to use this option,
Christina Lewellen 00:20:09
but I don't want to release access to my data. So do you
Christina Lewellen 00:20:12
guys have some examples of ways that independent schools are
Christina Lewellen 00:20:15
typically taking advantage of the one roster shared language?
Christina Lewellen 00:20:20
But are there also unique things that you've seen that are kind
Christina Lewellen 00:20:23
of cool, that this solution is essentially unlocking for
Christina Lewellen 00:20:27
schools? Yeah,
Stephen Boyle 00:20:28
absolutely. I typically think of this in the
Stephen Boyle 00:20:33
intended use, and then the other uses. One roster is really an
Stephen Boyle 00:20:38
LMS integration tool and standard from its intended use,
Stephen Boyle 00:20:43
meaning it produces rosters so that your external LMS can build
Stephen Boyle 00:20:48
its classes for the teachers and add the students automatically,
Stephen Boyle 00:20:51
so nobody's having to do Duba work there, and it returns
Stephen Boyle 00:20:54
grades and assignment information back to your sis
Stephen Boyle 00:20:58
automatically. And so that's the intended use. So examples are
Stephen Boyle 00:21:03
any LMS, and I'm sure that'll agree. The way that presents to
Stephen Boyle 00:21:07
us is our sales teams come and say, I've got a school that's on
Stephen Boyle 00:21:11
Google Classroom, that's on Microsoft school data sync, it's
Stephen Boyle 00:21:14
on whatever LMS we want to sell into that school, but we have to
Stephen Boyle 00:21:19
meet them where they are, so we need a system that will allow us
Stephen Boyle 00:21:23
to go into that school, and they will be successful from day one,
Stephen Boyle 00:21:27
because we integrate and once again, teachers don't have
Stephen Boyle 00:21:30
multiple logins all that. So that's the intended use. There
Stephen Boyle 00:21:33
are plenty of fun, odd anecdotal stories of somebody using one
Stephen Boyle 00:21:39
roster because it's just data. And one of the most recent ones
Stephen Boyle 00:21:43
that I had, it was a small communication tool that really
Stephen Boyle 00:21:45
just wanted the names and emails and SMS phone number, right,
Stephen Boyle 00:21:49
like one Roxbury produced that they like, we can do this. We're
Stephen Boyle 00:21:52
going to be an emergency service for the school. It was aimed at
Stephen Boyle 00:21:56
super small schools, so they didn't need full API
Stephen Boyle 00:22:00
functionality of you know, both of our systems have dedicated
Stephen Boyle 00:22:03
contact lists and things like that. That one roster is an LMS
Stephen Boyle 00:22:07
tool, so it's limited in some of the data. So these alternate,
Stephen Boyle 00:22:10
these non standard uses will go to it because of the standard
Stephen Boyle 00:22:15
it's data. They don't have to go and convince Blackbaud or
Stephen Boyle 00:22:18
anybody to write some dedicated thing for them. They don't have
Stephen Boyle 00:22:21
to figure out our proprietary API. So those are the fun
Stephen Boyle 00:22:25
stories. Is that off brand use? I
Thad White 00:22:27
would agree, yeah. And the most interesting ones
Thad White 00:22:30
that we've seen, so obviously, the BI directionality of one
Thad White 00:22:32
roster is what we typically focus on, right, database of
Thad White 00:22:35
record for demographic information and rostering and
Thad White 00:22:38
all of that, and database of record for grades and they
Thad White 00:22:40
share, right? Most of the interesting things that were
Thad White 00:22:43
somewhat unexpected is, to what degree and how many, how much
Thad White 00:22:47
interest there was, you know, just stopping at rostering,
Thad White 00:22:49
right? Like we have a lot of folks who ship rostering in that
Thad White 00:22:53
format, same thing Steven is talking about, just for the
Thad White 00:22:55
purpose of it's lightweight. They understand it is
Thad White 00:22:57
consistent. Rostering a demographic information. They're
Thad White 00:23:00
much easier to pull, perhaps, than developing individualized
Thad White 00:23:04
solutions for all that. So I was surprised by that. Over the last
Thad White 00:23:08
few years we've been doing this, just how many of them just say,
Thad White 00:23:10
yep, roster, and we just need that, and we don't have anything
Thad White 00:23:13
to do with an LMS, but we'll gladly pull that from you in the
Thad White 00:23:16
standard so I think that's encouraging that above and
Thad White 00:23:19
beyond, like we're always focusing on LMS style scenarios,
Thad White 00:23:23
but there's plenty of other folks who have nothing to do
Thad White 00:23:25
with LMS activities who are glad to adopt the standard and use it
Thad White 00:23:29
just for rostering, which is exciting, and I think
Bill Stites 00:23:32
that's a key point in terms of one roster is geared
Bill Stites 00:23:36
a lot towards managing the LMS features, those things that
Bill Stites 00:23:39
touch the classroom features, because the One thing I don't
Bill Stites 00:23:41
want to come out is sounding like a caveman, you know, like
Bill Stites 00:23:44
ABI bad. You know, it's not that all these other tools, all these
Bill Stites 00:23:49
other things I was leading with, you know, in terms of what are
Bill Stites 00:23:51
the problems that we're trying to solve with this, those
Bill Stites 00:23:53
things, they need to be there. They have a distinct place to
Bill Stites 00:23:57
it. But it's interesting when working with my colleague, Alek
Bill Stites 00:24:00
Duba, when we talk about things that Veracross can and can't do,
Bill Stites 00:24:03
it's kind of like you've got to be like Neo in the Matrix. You
Bill Stites 00:24:06
see the way in which the system is designed to work, but then
Bill Stites 00:24:11
you figure out how you can bend it to make it work, and make it
Bill Stites 00:24:14
work to suit your needs. And I think it's those unexpected ways
Bill Stites 00:24:18
in which, particularly as you said, that smaller companies,
Bill Stites 00:24:21
companies that don't have the resources to build out in this
Bill Stites 00:24:26
way. And Steven, I think you made this point as well. It
Bill Stites 00:24:28
gives everyone that one thing to build towards, and say, Okay, I
Bill Stites 00:24:32
don't need to worry about trying to read the Blackbaud API or the
Bill Stites 00:24:38
Veracross API or the vendor X API. I can just look at this one
Bill Stites 00:24:43
thing and draw out of it what I need and maybe supplement with
Bill Stites 00:24:46
other things, but you can definitely do it in that way. I
Bill Stites 00:24:49
think it's awesome. Peter
Christina Lewellen 00:24:50
our producer, Peter Frank, I think
Christina Lewellen 00:24:52
we're going to need to order some T shirts that say API bad
Stephen Boyle 00:24:56
and put Bill's face. We have a new meme.
Christina Lewellen 00:24:59
I. Think we do. Sorry. Hiram, go ahead,
Christina Lewellen 00:25:01
yeah,
Hiram Cuevas 00:25:02
I think what's really interesting there is to
Hiram Cuevas 00:25:04
Bill's point and everybody's discussing so far, the rostering
Hiram Cuevas 00:25:07
is a key component, but it also allows these vendors who excel
Hiram Cuevas 00:25:11
at creating these ancillary resources to excel at that and
Hiram Cuevas 00:25:14
focus on that, so that you get some great teaching and learning
Hiram Cuevas 00:25:17
going on in those spaces. And really you end up with the major
Hiram Cuevas 00:25:21
sis and systems being, you know, the hubs and the cores of that
Hiram Cuevas 00:25:25
data for those ancillary systems,
Stephen Boyle 00:25:27
yep, and that is the great thing about it,
Stephen Boyle 00:25:29
because more than just LMS is even slightly adjacent tools.
Stephen Boyle 00:25:34
We've already mentioned, some of them, like learning materials,
Stephen Boyle 00:25:37
like you've got a textbook management system that you want
Stephen Boyle 00:25:40
to associate with a textbook with a class, so you need to
Stephen Boyle 00:25:44
load the classes in and the rosters for the classes, but
Stephen Boyle 00:25:46
you're not passing grades back. You don't have to do the rest of
Stephen Boyle 00:25:49
that connection. So that company can rely on the data and the
Stephen Boyle 00:25:53
fact that you've got user data and roster data and can build up
Stephen Boyle 00:25:57
for what they need. And then I've worked with a lot of
Stephen Boyle 00:25:59
partners, and it's interesting to see the evolution of the
Stephen Boyle 00:26:01
partner itself. Think of it in terms of a startup. A startup
Stephen Boyle 00:26:04
can do a very lightweight use of data, and it applies across a
Stephen Boyle 00:26:08
lot of vendors. And so they can start there, and that'll get
Stephen Boyle 00:26:12
them to that 50% point of what they want. And then they can go
Stephen Boyle 00:26:16
back and say, Okay, I've got this data, and I can have this
Stephen Boyle 00:26:19
functionality that I've got across the board. Now let me go
Stephen Boyle 00:26:22
supplement it with their proprietary API functionality
Stephen Boyle 00:26:26
that's not available through one roster. But then I can go to
Stephen Boyle 00:26:30
that vendors clients and say, Hey, you're with Blackbaud,
Stephen Boyle 00:26:33
you're with their across we can also do this. So then that
Stephen Boyle 00:26:38
partner has a stepping stool to each phase of their development.
Stephen Boyle 00:26:43
I've loved walking these partners grow into that. It's
Stephen Boyle 00:26:46
interesting, and it takes a while to see it happen, but it
Stephen Boyle 00:26:48
is cool to watch. So one of the
Bill Stites 00:26:51
things that I think is an area where even with like
Bill Stites 00:26:55
the APIs that may be out there, just using straight APIs, not
Bill Stites 00:26:58
using one roster that come up is, I think there's certain
Bill Stites 00:27:01
limitations, or there's certain things that I'd be curious to
Bill Stites 00:27:04
hear your thoughts on around issues related to DEI efforts,
Bill Stites 00:27:08
because I think one of the things that we've struggled with
Bill Stites 00:27:11
with certain APIs that we've used in the past is that, for
Bill Stites 00:27:15
instance, when we have name changes for whatever reason, and
Bill Stites 00:27:20
we say that in the school, and I'm going to use a Veracross
Bill Stites 00:27:23
example, because that's what I know. But if we're using
Bill Stites 00:27:26
Preferred Name, and we want preferred name use, so we'll put
Bill Stites 00:27:30
in a preferred name. So I'll use myself. My first name is
Bill Stites 00:27:33
William. My preferred name is Bill. What I want showing up
Bill Stites 00:27:37
everywhere is bill. But if your API is pulling my first name,
Bill Stites 00:27:42
they're pulling William. And when I see William, I said, this
Bill Stites 00:27:46
person or this school doesn't know who I am. They don't see me
Bill Stites 00:27:49
for who I am, because my name is Bill, right? William is the name
Bill Stites 00:27:53
that I was given, but Bill is who I am. So how do you think
Bill Stites 00:27:58
about the solve around those and I'll pick on Thad for a second
Bill Stites 00:28:02
here, not to exclude picking on Steven, because I love picking
Bill Stites 00:28:05
on everyone equally. And Thad knows this very, very well about
Bill Stites 00:28:07
me. But like I opened up our back end, and I went to the API
Bill Stites 00:28:11
the section here, and I'm looking at what is the given
Bill Stites 00:28:14
name, which is, again, that normalized field header for
Bill Stites 00:28:18
first name, and what Veracross is supplying his first name, but
Bill Stites 00:28:23
if we do that, William's not going to be bill where we need
Bill Stites 00:28:27
him to be bill. And if the systems in our gender, we've got
Bill Stites 00:28:31
male, female, non binary. Well, what if the lists are different?
Bill Stites 00:28:34
How do you solve for those types of problems?
Thad White 00:28:38
Absolutely, it's challenging, right? And I think
Thad White 00:28:40
not only software vendors, but schools, we're all wrestling
Thad White 00:28:43
with the same thing, right? And ultimately, in my mind, it boils
Thad White 00:28:46
down to, I've been having a lot of conversation around this in
Thad White 00:28:50
the background, right? How do you convey and maintain agency
Thad White 00:28:53
over personal identity as a person? Bill. You have the right
Thad White 00:28:57
to expect that people refer to you by Bill, and that extends to
Thad White 00:29:00
the expectations applied to the software vendors you work with,
Thad White 00:29:03
just like you're saying. I mean, think historically, we've
Thad White 00:29:05
applied some generic, systematic rules behind the scenes to go,
Thad White 00:29:08
Okay, we have a field for preferred name, use that here,
Thad White 00:29:12
there, and otherwise, how do we facilitate you saying, my
Thad White 00:29:16
preferred name is Bill, and I want it to be used in these
Thad White 00:29:19
contexts, right? That's a broader question that we're
Thad White 00:29:21
wrestling with, but above and beyond that, every standard is
Thad White 00:29:26
constantly building in the same way that we all are. And so it's
Thad White 00:29:30
certainly a challenge that all companies, everybody I've talked
Thad White 00:29:33
to who, especially in technology, is all working
Thad White 00:29:36
through. How do we structure this better? Is it the addition
Thad White 00:29:39
of additional fields related to identity. Where we expand on
Thad White 00:29:43
these things is our notion of name, for instance, being x
Thad White 00:29:48
number of fields that represent your name? Are there
Thad White 00:29:51
alternatives? Are there differentiation between legal
Thad White 00:29:54
name and preferred name versus any number of other things,
Thad White 00:29:57
right? And so I think the challenge. Right? And I don't
Thad White 00:30:00
have an answer for you, Bill, just to be clear, I think the
Thad White 00:30:03
challenge we're all up against is, as we develop and as
Thad White 00:30:07
culturally globally, we discern what the appropriate mechanism
Thad White 00:30:12
and ways of approaching identity broadly and agency within that
Thad White 00:30:16
identity, especially in software develop. How do we all keep in
Thad White 00:30:20
sync so that we're developing, again, sort of a standard on
Thad White 00:30:24
expectations around how we model those things in software, and
Thad White 00:30:28
then how do standards like one roster keep track with that? And
Thad White 00:30:31
I think it's just open and honest communication discussions
Thad White 00:30:34
amongst people facilitated by places like one ed tech that are
Thad White 00:30:37
talking about, hey, we're all facing the same kind of
Thad White 00:30:40
challenge. How are we approaching it as a community of
Thad White 00:30:44
software vendors, right? What are our expectations? How are we
Thad White 00:30:47
thinking about the future of this and developing this to the
Thad White 00:30:50
benefit of our schools and the people in our schools, right?
Thad White 00:30:53
Because ultimately, it's a person centric thing that we
Thad White 00:30:56
want to get right, and I think everybody wants to get it right.
Thad White 00:30:59
You know, it's just immensely challenging, and in a good way,
Stephen Boyle 00:31:02
completely agree with that. It's well put that
Stephen Boyle 00:31:06
this is more than the standard. It's a community discussion, and
Stephen Boyle 00:31:10
the pressures on one roster come from different areas. I
Stephen Boyle 00:31:14
sometimes describe one roster as a five corner carpet for a four
Stephen Boyle 00:31:17
corner rim. It covers a lot. It's not perfect. So there are
Stephen Boyle 00:31:21
gaps, and you have to deal with the gaps. The devil's in the
Stephen Boyle 00:31:23
details right in terms of the implementation, etc. And this
Stephen Boyle 00:31:27
dei conversation, you can almost look at my backlog and see the
Stephen Boyle 00:31:30
conversation happen in the work items that we had to deliver and
Stephen Boyle 00:31:35
the blackboard, it presents as a school coming and saying, I'm an
Stephen Boyle 00:31:39
independent school and I promote my school as connected to its
Stephen Boyle 00:31:46
community, understanding its students. And if my teacher
Stephen Boyle 00:31:50
says, William, are you here when they're taking attendance, that
Stephen Boyle 00:31:54
is saying you don't know who I am to that student and that
Stephen Boyle 00:31:57
family is just one degree farther separated from my
Stephen Boyle 00:32:00
school, or even we talk about parents. Yes, parents same
Stephen Boyle 00:32:04
thing,
Christina Lewellen 00:32:05
maybe a Mr. And Mr. A miss and a miss kind
Christina Lewellen 00:32:08
of thing. And so there needs to be some flexibility in what our
Christina Lewellen 00:32:11
families look like. Yeah, the
Stephen Boyle 00:32:12
first step in this conversation, in my one
Stephen Boyle 00:32:15
roster work that we did was we need to present preferred name,
Stephen Boyle 00:32:19
because this is where the teacher is talking to the kid.
Stephen Boyle 00:32:22
This isn't legal name scenario. LMS is the intended use. So I
Stephen Boyle 00:32:27
said, Oh, okay, I'll change the data that goes out through one
Stephen Boyle 00:32:29
roster and made a preferred name. Boom. I immediately got
Stephen Boyle 00:32:33
kickback, because some of the uses need first name, their uses
Stephen Boyle 00:32:37
where they're dealing with monetary accounts that need to
Stephen Boyle 00:32:40
be the legal name, because it's eventually going to their
Stephen Boyle 00:32:43
general ledger, etc. So then we had to go back and it becomes,
Stephen Boyle 00:32:46
when you implement one roster, the SIS has leeway on how much
Stephen Boyle 00:32:50
flexibility and how many choices are available to the data
Stephen Boyle 00:32:54
definition that goes out. So we had to add, we had to switch
Stephen Boyle 00:32:57
back first. We delivered first name, then we changed it to
Stephen Boyle 00:33:00
preferred name, and then we had to add the option, because it's
Stephen Boyle 00:33:03
different for each school. Now there's that option, and we even
Stephen Boyle 00:33:06
had, if you talk about LMS being the Inte, we had a school, a
Stephen Boyle 00:33:11
conservative group of schools. It was a Catholic Diocese that
Stephen Boyle 00:33:15
wanted had their position in the debate, and it meant that the
Stephen Boyle 00:33:19
software had to reflect their position and their stance to
Stephen Boyle 00:33:22
their community. And that community expected that, and
Stephen Boyle 00:33:25
they were accepting of that, and it is a community discussion,
Stephen Boyle 00:33:29
but software needs to be there for the school, and the school
Stephen Boyle 00:33:34
has to be there for their community, for their students.
Stephen Boyle 00:33:37
You know, those pressures come from both directions. And like I
Stephen Boyle 00:33:40
said, there's only one given name field. We even did the same
Stephen Boyle 00:33:44
thing for last name. Imagine the scenario where you have a
Stephen Boyle 00:33:47
divorced family. The kid's legal name is William Johnson, but
Stephen Boyle 00:33:52
he's so mad at his dad right now. He's adopted his mom's
Stephen Boyle 00:33:56
maiden name is his last name, and he goes by Bill, so he's you
Stephen Boyle 00:34:00
want both of those things. And so once again, the pressure
Stephen Boyle 00:34:02
comes from the school. I want to meet my kids where they are. I
Stephen Boyle 00:34:05
need to present myself as connected to my community. So
Stephen Boyle 00:34:09
one of
Bill Stites 00:34:10
the follow ups to that, and you both kind of
Bill Stites 00:34:12
alluded to this, you know, one roster is what we're working
Bill Stites 00:34:15
towards. To what level do each of you, either individually or
Bill Stites 00:34:20
as a company have a voice in the facilitation of the development
Bill Stites 00:34:26
of this standard, because is this being simply prescriptive,
Bill Stites 00:34:30
or is there an open dialog about how to solve this problems
Bill Stites 00:34:34
amongst others that may arise?
Christina Lewellen 00:34:36
Yeah. Do they listen to you? I understand
Stephen Boyle 00:34:38
that there's a council of advisors for one
Stephen Boyle 00:34:41
roster. I have no idea how they decide on that, or what the
Stephen Boyle 00:34:45
meeting sound like. I've not talked to anyone. I'm not even
Stephen Boyle 00:34:47
sure who to talk to. Maybe that has a better connection there.
Stephen Boyle 00:34:51
I'll echo that.
Thad White 00:34:52
We, to date, have not played a big role in
Thad White 00:34:55
participating in those conversations. To Steve's point,
Thad White 00:34:58
there is a guiding directive board. Board, but we're not
Thad White 00:35:01
participant in that at the moment, if
Christina Lewellen 00:35:03
you did have a seat at the table, is there
Christina Lewellen 00:35:06
something at the top of y'all list that you would ask them to
Christina Lewellen 00:35:08
consider? Ooh, great
Stephen Boyle 00:35:11
question. It is a good question. I think it's
Stephen Boyle 00:35:13
gonna come down to pet peeves to some degree, and mine would be
Stephen Boyle 00:35:17
assignment categories. Assignment Categories to date
Stephen Boyle 00:35:21
have been this one big list, and a lot of the solutions that work
Stephen Boyle 00:35:25
with us define the assignment categories on a per class basis.
Stephen Boyle 00:35:30
Once again, it's the five cornered rug and the four
Stephen Boyle 00:35:32
cornered room. There's slight differences between the way that
Stephen Boyle 00:35:36
the LMS operates in the way that we operate, and that transition
Stephen Boyle 00:35:40
is fraught with peril. I
Thad White 00:35:42
think if I'm being selfish, the thing that would
Thad White 00:35:45
help me the most is probably the coverage of term and final
Thad White 00:35:49
grades. So right now, we consume assignments and assignment
Thad White 00:35:53
grades as part of the standard. Most common thing that I see the
Thad White 00:35:58
standard does not cover weighting definitions. So the
Thad White 00:36:02
way that assignments are weighted, in terms of how term
Thad White 00:36:05
and final grades get calculated, can differ between systems, and
Thad White 00:36:09
we're somewhat blind to that. So the school is then in the
Thad White 00:36:13
position to go, well, is the weighting the same for this
Thad White 00:36:15
class as it is in Veracross and the LMS? There's a lot of
Thad White 00:36:18
confusion that arises from that, just as a lack of definition,
Thad White 00:36:22
and the outcome of that is ultimately the worst thing,
Thad White 00:36:26
because you get to the end of the term and the teacher goes,
Thad White 00:36:29
it says it's an 80 9b in the LMS, but in Veracross, it's an
Thad White 00:36:33
87 Why the heck is that calculation different? And then
Thad White 00:36:36
the work to track that down and go, Well, this assignment, to
Thad White 00:36:40
your point, Steven, about the status is this assignment was
Thad White 00:36:43
this status of Veracross, which gets exempted from inclusion in
Thad White 00:36:47
the overall calculation, right? There's this, which assignment
Thad White 00:36:51
grades are we factoring into that great calculation, and how
Thad White 00:36:55
we recently discovered one that was the definition of drop
Thad White 00:36:58
lowest grade actually differed between how we were thinking
Thad White 00:37:02
about it in an LMS vendor, right? And so when I talk to
Thad White 00:37:05
schools about this, what I usually hear is, we love the way
Thad White 00:37:09
our LMS does it. We wish we could just pass those grades as
Thad White 00:37:12
they are calculated there in Veracross and publish report
Thad White 00:37:16
cards consistently. I'm hearing that over and over again, so if
Thad White 00:37:19
they were capable of handling that exchange, and we don't have
Thad White 00:37:22
to worry about the calculation in both systems. That would do
Thad White 00:37:25
me
Stephen Boyle 00:37:26
a lot of favors. I look at that as well. I
Stephen Boyle 00:37:29
consistently, in fact, you talk about the calculation in the si
Stephen Boyle 00:37:33
s not reflecting it's almost like we need the metadata, like
Stephen Boyle 00:37:36
you set up calculations this way, if we could pass back and
Stephen Boyle 00:37:39
forth, that kind of thing that helps the problem. Another one,
Stephen Boyle 00:37:44
and this also helps the problem. But one, it feels like a cheat,
Stephen Boyle 00:37:47
but it's still a reality, is that teachers, they see that 89
Stephen Boyle 00:37:51
they know that kid is improved or something, and they're not
Stephen Boyle 00:37:55
changing the calculation. They're not changing any of the
Stephen Boyle 00:37:57
grades. They just make it an A to be reported, so that fudge
Stephen Boyle 00:38:02
factor that is inherent in the teachers understanding of their
Stephen Boyle 00:38:06
class and their students isn't represented by what one roster
Stephen Boyle 00:38:09
is able to deliver, so it has to be handled elsewhere. It means
Stephen Boyle 00:38:13
that there's an additional step for teachers. Once again, the
Stephen Boyle 00:38:16
idea is to reduce friction. One roster does a great job of
Stephen Boyle 00:38:20
getting us to a certain point in that journey, but there's always
Stephen Boyle 00:38:23
that last mile. Yeah, right, the cable companies that last mile
Stephen Boyle 00:38:27
was the most expensive. Sometimes. That's
Christina Lewellen 00:38:30
a great analogy. Does that resonate with
Christina Lewellen 00:38:31
you guys? Bill and Hiram, do those examples make sense to
Christina Lewellen 00:38:34
you? Would you have anything on your wish list based on your
Christina Lewellen 00:38:37
experiences with one roster?
Bill Stites 00:38:40
To me, it's always these nuanced little differences
Bill Stites 00:38:43
that come up that are the things that similar to the DEI
Bill Stites 00:38:47
question. These are the little things that are just part and
Bill Stites 00:38:51
parcel of school. You know, you mentioned that little fudge
Bill Stites 00:38:54
factor, like, Man, this kid's really worked hard. I'm gonna
Bill Stites 00:38:57
give them the benefit of the bump and help them out there.
Bill Stites 00:38:59
And it's those things you know, you can solve for 98 99% of the
Bill Stites 00:39:04
problems. But if it's that 1% and that 1% takes away that
Bill Stites 00:39:09
individual ownership of acknowledging the student, that
Bill Stites 00:39:13
1% may weigh a lot heavier in terms of what you're able to do.
Bill Stites 00:39:18
So it's not the overall percentage weight that you put
Bill Stites 00:39:20
on that type of a problem, but what that problem means to the
Bill Stites 00:39:24
work that's going to go in to rectify it or normalize it on
Bill Stites 00:39:28
the back end.
Stephen Boyle 00:39:29
And Kristina,
Hiram Cuevas 00:39:30
I would say, you know, when we refer to that USB
Hiram Cuevas 00:39:32
analogy early on in our conversation, that is so much
Hiram Cuevas 00:39:35
simpler by comparison to this human factor that we're dealing
Hiram Cuevas 00:39:39
with when we're talking about one roster and the nuances and
Hiram Cuevas 00:39:42
the fact that it's supposed to be a standard, but we all know
Hiram Cuevas 00:39:46
that independent schools are special, and they all want to be
Hiram Cuevas 00:39:50
treated as such, and that their way is unique, and that's how
Hiram Cuevas 00:39:55
they reach their communities. That is the challenge of trying
Hiram Cuevas 00:39:58
to apply to. These standards across independent schools in
Hiram Cuevas 00:40:02
general.
Bill Stites 00:40:03
One of the things that I want to ask, too is we're
Bill Stites 00:40:06
talking about the one rostered standard around this LMS type
Bill Stites 00:40:10
data. And one of the questions I have, and it's from a little bit
Bill Stites 00:40:14
of a broader experience here, how many standards are you
Bill Stites 00:40:17
working towards? Because it may be as difficult as trying to
Bill Stites 00:40:22
develop your own API and develop those connections. And is one
Bill Stites 00:40:26
roster a US based standard, or is it an international standard
Bill Stites 00:40:31
that is applied and used? And you know, that raises in my
Bill Stites 00:40:34
response was, you know, we're both working with an Australian
Bill Stites 00:40:36
school, and what applies there, like I've learned, what the list
Bill Stites 00:40:40
standard is, which is something we don't use here in the States.
Bill Stites 00:40:43
How many standards are there? And is having things like this
Bill Stites 00:40:48
solving problems or just adding to the laundry list of things
Bill Stites 00:40:52
that you need to develop around?
Stephen Boyle 00:40:55
It's both, because
Thad White 00:40:56
it solves the problem. It gets you to a point,
Thad White 00:40:58
but when you get to that point, you start living there, you
Thad White 00:41:00
start realizing the shortcomings, and then even one
Thad White 00:41:04
roster has a version. I think most of the industry is still
Thad White 00:41:07
integrated with 1.1 but they have a 1.2 and they've iterated
Thad White 00:41:12
and adopted, and think that we've referred to international
Thad White 00:41:15
business and Australian schools and international schools in
Thad White 00:41:19
general, and lower schools, for instance, typically deal with
Thad White 00:41:23
skills and mastery as opposed to grades, and that's nowhere in
Thad White 00:41:28
one roster, but the 1.2 version is trying to bring it in. When
Thad White 00:41:34
you talk about how many standards are you trying to
Thad White 00:41:37
write to? Not only are there multiple standards that we all
Thad White 00:41:40
try to adopt. But the standards themselves have their own
Thad White 00:41:44
multiple sets of rules, right, like 1.1 versus 1.2 and having
Thad White 00:41:47
to adopt the next best thing. And the challenge there, just
Thad White 00:41:52
like with the USB argument, when they made USB C, all the
Thad White 00:41:55
manufacturers then have to agree, and the next machine has
Thad White 00:41:58
to come out with it, and then the wire producers like
Thad White 00:42:01
everybody has to agree when to start using it, to make it
Thad White 00:42:04
worthwhile for people to start implementing it, and that's
Thad White 00:42:08
another argument in it, you know. So I'm not even sure where
Thad White 00:42:10
that one lands. I think we're in the middle of that one. I agree
Thad White 00:42:13
many, many, right? The thing that's top of mind for me and
Thad White 00:42:17
not to bridge into a very large conversation we likely don't
Thad White 00:42:20
have time for. But in addition to standards that aim to solve
Thad White 00:42:24
problems, we're seeing a burgeoning set of realities
Thad White 00:42:28
related to standards that are governmentally related. So
Thad White 00:42:34
whether that's standards that are adopted by individual states
Thad White 00:42:37
in the United States, or governmental standards
Thad White 00:42:40
externally, where the expectations and the reality of
Thad White 00:42:44
failing to satisfy that standard have much more severe
Thad White 00:42:47
consequences to both the school and the vendor than the sort of
Thad White 00:42:52
opt in. Okay, we want the opportunity to speak the same
Thad White 00:42:55
language as everybody. So I think for us, Bill, a lot of
Thad White 00:42:58
thought about particularly, and you're right, in Australia,
Thad White 00:43:01
we're seeing a lot of this. There's a lot of background
Thad White 00:43:04
conversation going on. But in the US, we're seeing an influx
Thad White 00:43:06
of state specific governmental standards, stuff like Ed five,
Thad White 00:43:11
variations on Ed five. So there are questions as we look ahead,
Thad White 00:43:16
especially as schools are thinking about changing
Thad White 00:43:18
realities. Any proposed changes to Department of Ed at a
Thad White 00:43:22
governmental level in the United States. What does that mean?
Thad White 00:43:25
Does that invoke each state going this way and having
Thad White 00:43:28
different standards? Do we then have 50 US standards for
Thad White 00:43:31
governmental compliance we have to align with right and so I
Thad White 00:43:34
think many, many is the answer. There different levels of
Thad White 00:43:38
severity on impact there, but lots of thought behind the
Thad White 00:43:42
scenes into how standards play into the future of what we're
Thad White 00:43:45
doing,
Stephen Boyle 00:43:46
and those standards encroach on the
Stephen Boyle 00:43:48
Independent School market in surprising ways. I think that
Stephen Boyle 00:43:53
they've been insulated from the 50 state problem in a lot of
Stephen Boyle 00:43:56
ways, and the vendors to independent schools have been
Stephen Boyle 00:43:59
because they haven't had to do state reporting. Now, with that
Stephen Boyle 00:44:02
broad argument of vouchers and government money going to an
Stephen Boyle 00:44:05
independent schools taking advantage of that, the second
Stephen Boyle 00:44:08
they start taking money that is from a government, they have to
Stephen Boyle 00:44:12
start reporting according to what the government requires in
Stephen Boyle 00:44:14
order for that money to be acceptable. And that's where you
Stephen Boyle 00:44:18
have those standards, which then puts the pressure back in the
Stephen Boyle 00:44:21
vendors court, but then it's multiplied by 50 plus
Stephen Boyle 00:44:26
international at that point, standards can proliferate
Stephen Boyle 00:44:29
quickly. So would one roster
Christina Lewellen 00:44:32
compatibility or, let's say there's a tool
Christina Lewellen 00:44:35
that a tech leader or a school is evaluating, and they want to
Christina Lewellen 00:44:39
kind of say, we need this tool, and it's between tool A and B.
Christina Lewellen 00:44:43
Is one roster a deciding factor is that a question that you ask,
Christina Lewellen 00:44:47
like in the search process, rather than the whole Yeah, we
Christina Lewellen 00:44:51
can do an API bill and Hiram. Do you guys go out and say you need
Christina Lewellen 00:44:55
to speak one roster? Because one roster speaks to Veracross and
Christina Lewellen 00:44:59
Blackbaud. Yeah, absolutely,
Hiram Cuevas 00:45:00
it's definitely part of the conversation. Needs
Hiram Cuevas 00:45:03
to be a prerequisite bill, and I have suffered immensely with
Hiram Cuevas 00:45:05
data silos, and we've worked really hard to get most of our
Hiram Cuevas 00:45:09
applications and services talking to each other with
Hiram Cuevas 00:45:12
intentionality. And so there's got to be a really good reason
Hiram Cuevas 00:45:16
for us to utilize a product that does not offer that API is good.
Hiram Cuevas 00:45:22
Still, in this case, we need that API, or we need the one
Hiram Cuevas 00:45:27
roster functionality, or we haven't mentioned it, but LTI as
Hiram Cuevas 00:45:30
well.
Bill Stites 00:45:31
My question is always, how can I move my data
Bill Stites 00:45:34
around? What are the solutions that you're offering me to do
Bill Stites 00:45:37
that, and one roster for the services and the tools that
Bill Stites 00:45:41
leverage that definitely give me a short answer as compared to a
Bill Stites 00:45:47
long answer. And I think the short answer is, yes, we support
Bill Stites 00:45:50
one roster. Okay, I know what one roster does and doesn't do.
Bill Stites 00:45:54
Or it might be, yeah, we have an API for that. Okay, well, then
Bill Stites 00:45:58
we've got to talk about the API. What is the API going to do, or,
Bill Stites 00:46:01
Yes, we can do, I'm just going to use a Veracross, and we've
Bill Stites 00:46:04
got a data package for that. You know, you can build a query and
Bill Stites 00:46:07
export it out, and then somebody can grab it and pick it up and
Bill Stites 00:46:10
do what they want, with which there's a good deal of
Bill Stites 00:46:11
flexibility to that. So it's something nice, but again, it's
Bill Stites 00:46:14
a point of break. So it's a layers of answers that I'm
Bill Stites 00:46:16
looking for, and at the top of that is one roster, because it's
Bill Stites 00:46:21
the thing I suffer from most, which is giving the shortest
Bill Stites 00:46:24
answer. It's the shortest answer. I know what it does, and
Bill Stites 00:46:26
I can kind of
Stephen Boyle 00:46:27
move on. And Kristina,
Hiram Cuevas 00:46:28
what we're doing is we're juggling all of those
Hiram Cuevas 00:46:30
different form factors. If you think about it as IT directors,
Hiram Cuevas 00:46:33
we have applications that utilize one roster. We have some
Hiram Cuevas 00:46:36
that utilize SSO, we have some that utilize API. We have some
Hiram Cuevas 00:46:39
that have manual transfers of data. You've got that three
Hiram Cuevas 00:46:42
headed monster, and you're trying really hard to balance
Hiram Cuevas 00:46:45
all those things. It's
Christina Lewellen 00:46:46
interesting. Let me turn it now to our SIS
Christina Lewellen 00:46:49
vendors on the call here. Do you guys also nudge your clients
Christina Lewellen 00:46:53
your schools towards solutions that because one roster is a
Christina Lewellen 00:46:58
quick yes or an easier Yes? Are you helping guide them down this
Christina Lewellen 00:47:02
path?
Stephen Boyle 00:47:03
The answer, from our perspective, usually is, if
Stephen Boyle 00:47:06
there's one tool that integrates using one roster and one tool
Stephen Boyle 00:47:09
that doesn't integrate, that's like the obvious solution. And
Stephen Boyle 00:47:13
Hiram point of all the different form factors that he's dealing
Stephen Boyle 00:47:15
with, illustrates it is what they're looking for is a
Stephen Boyle 00:47:19
simplicity of training, simplicity of the system itself.
Stephen Boyle 00:47:24
They don't want teachers to have multiple logins, they don't want
Stephen Boyle 00:47:27
data silos. They don't want that extra friction. So I think that
Stephen Boyle 00:47:31
the schools are okay with really any solution that solves those
Stephen Boyle 00:47:35
problems. Just one roster is an easy question to ask of a
Stephen Boyle 00:47:39
vendor. So I think that that's one of the places where it
Stephen Boyle 00:47:42
really shines, is that you can say, do you integrate with
Stephen Boyle 00:47:45
Blackbaud? You integrate with Veracross, or you say, do you
Stephen Boyle 00:47:47
integrate with one roster? Any of
Thad White 00:47:50
those work, I think, and provided it checks the boxes
Thad White 00:47:54
that keep their life the simplest. I think they're
Thad White 00:47:58
willing to adopt any of the answers. But like Bill said, One
Thad White 00:48:01
roster is the short answer, yeah, I think that's fair.
Thad White 00:48:05
Certainly, when we get schools asking about vendors we don't
Thad White 00:48:09
know we're not partnered with, right? One of the first
Thad White 00:48:11
questions is, okay, what's the easiest path to delivering on
Thad White 00:48:14
your expectations for integration between the
Thad White 00:48:16
platforms? If one roster is the answer, we all cheer, right?
Thad White 00:48:19
Like that's good news, but in a similar fashion, working down,
Thad White 00:48:22
okay, you don't do one roster. Can you integrate with our API,
Thad White 00:48:25
so on and so forth, down the ladder of preference, if you
Thad White 00:48:28
will, I would say so far as like school has a need that they
Thad White 00:48:33
reach out and go, Hey, is there a vendor that you all prefer to
Thad White 00:48:35
work with? The answer there is. It depends. So obviously it's
Thad White 00:48:39
easier on us for one roster, but the vendor in question has to
Thad White 00:48:42
fit the needs of schools first and foremost. Like, what is the
Thad White 00:48:44
best opportunity for you all to find success in working with a
Thad White 00:48:49
vendor? And we're going to be open and honest about that,
Thad White 00:48:51
regardless of the degree of pain involved with us working with
Thad White 00:48:55
them. But yeah, certainly a one roster is a part of all of those
Thad White 00:48:58
conversations, just as the in road to do we understand what it
Thad White 00:49:02
will look like to get up and running with this vendor for
Thad White 00:49:05
you, and I think that from both of our perspectives, best answer
Thad White 00:49:09
is they work with our proprietary API, because it's
Thad White 00:49:12
easier for them to be more tightly integrated with exactly
Thad White 00:49:15
the data structure that we present. Next best, I think, is
Thad White 00:49:19
one roster, because we know that they've written to the standard,
Thad White 00:49:22
and everybody has an expectation of what's coming and what's
Thad White 00:49:25
going and then after that is the more manual or CSV SFTP kind of
Thad White 00:49:31
solutions. So there is a hierarchy. Obviously, we want it
Thad White 00:49:34
to be as tightly bound as possible, but there are multiple
Stephen Boyle 00:49:38
ways to solve that. Abi good. We need the T
Stephen Boyle 00:49:42
shirts now,
Christina Lewellen 00:49:43
or maybe two sided shirts, one on the front,
Christina Lewellen 00:49:45
one on the back. All right. So before we wrap up, we started
Christina Lewellen 00:49:48
today. Thad and Steven, we were talking about our animals. So do
Christina Lewellen 00:49:52
you guys have pets?
Stephen Boyle 00:49:54
Have a cat? Have to tape to the wall whenever a
Stephen Boyle 00:49:56
meeting comes on,
Christina Lewellen 00:49:59
taping the. Cat to the wall. Steven, Steven,
Christina Lewellen 00:50:06
I don't think you want to admit that on air. How about you?
Christina Lewellen 00:50:10
Thad,
Thad White 00:50:11
my wife and I have a cat, Harley, a dog, Lena, a
Thad White 00:50:15
little Cocker, and then we have a goat. Jolene, you have a goat?
Thad White 00:50:20
I have a goat? Yeah, we have a Nubian goat. Nick. We have a
Thad White 00:50:22
winner. How big is it? Rather large. I mean, she's an adult,
Thad White 00:50:26
so she's waist or higher. She's full grown goat.
Christina Lewellen 00:50:29
You have a large goat named Jolene, indeed.
Unknown 00:50:33
Do you do yoga with your goat?
Thad White 00:50:35
No, although that might be a side hustle, I'll
Thad White 00:50:37
have to pick up when it gets warmer.
Bill Stites 00:50:40
Pat. My dog is waist high. So, I mean, like,
Bill Stites 00:50:42
seriously,
Stephen Boyle 00:50:43
probably equivalent size. Yeah. Have you
Stephen Boyle 00:50:45
gotten Jolene to sing the Taylor Swift song with you, to have the
Stephen Boyle 00:50:50
scream scene?
Thad White 00:50:52
No, that's a good idea, though.
Christina Lewellen 00:50:53
You know, I think that we're gonna need a
Christina Lewellen 00:50:55
picture of Jolene to drop in the show notes, because now I have,
Christina Lewellen 00:50:58
we're gonna be here another hour.
Unknown 00:51:01
I want to see the cat taped to the wall.
Stephen Boyle 00:51:08
I'll find that picture, maybe Velcro, but you
Stephen Boyle 00:51:11
know,
Christina Lewellen 00:51:15
all right, we're gonna need some pictures
Christina Lewellen 00:51:16
for the show notes. You guys, I'm so grateful to both
Christina Lewellen 00:51:20
Veracross and Blackbaud for lending you to us for this hour.
Christina Lewellen 00:51:23
This has been really incredible. And what's great is that we kept
Christina Lewellen 00:51:26
it, I think, at a high enough level to be impactful, and not
Christina Lewellen 00:51:30
getting too techie, but also kind of diving into why this
Christina Lewellen 00:51:33
matters. And so I'm grateful that you were on the pod with us
Christina Lewellen 00:51:36
today to help us sort it all out. And Bill and Hiram, you
Christina Lewellen 00:51:39
guys are right. This was a great topic, and grateful that you
Christina Lewellen 00:51:41
brought
Bill Stites 00:51:41
it to us. Awesome. That's one thing we did right
Christina Lewellen 00:51:45
for the moment. All right, guys, thanks
Christina Lewellen 00:51:48
so much. Have a great day.
Peter Frank 00:51:52
This has been talking technology with Atlas,
Peter Frank 00:51:54
produced by the Association of Technology Leaders in
Peter Frank 00:51:57
Independent Schools. For more information about Atlas and
Peter Frank 00:52:01
Atlas membership, please visit the atlas.org if you enjoyed
Peter Frank 00:52:05
this discussion, please subscribe, leave a review and
Peter Frank 00:52:08
share this podcast with your colleagues in the independent
Peter Frank 00:52:11
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