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An Introduction to PESC Standards

What they are and what they can do for you

Jam HamidiBccampus

PESC TAB member

jhamidi@bccampus.ca

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● Standards are so universally used that they are often taken for granted. While some might consider them to be about as interesting as watching grass grow, without them, modern life as we know it would unravel.

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● Imagine Tom jumping from Institution to institution over his long “professional” career:● From province to province.● From country to country.

● Imagine his Transcripts, Achievements, Awards, Loans, Credits, Courses.

● Imagine the administrative burden.● Protection of his identity (by law).

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PESC org

● PESC - the Postsecondary Electronic Standards Council

● Established in 1997 at the National Center for Higher Education in Washington, DC.

● Non-profit, community-based, umbrella association● AACRAO, ACT, Brigham Young University, Educause, Citibank, COHEAO,

Datatel, EFC, ETS, Harbinger-Supply Tech, KPMG, Law School Admission Council, NACUBO, NASFAA, NCHELP, New York University, Pearson, Sallie Mae, Sungard SCT, SLSA, University of Oklahoma, University of Texas at Austin, U.S. Department of Education

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PESC org

● Factors in formation of PESC (90s):● Y2K● Electronic Transcripts● FDSLP (Federal Direct Student Loan Program)● EASI (Easy Assessor for Students and Institutions)

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● The hub relieves each sender and receiver of having to connect peer to peer and of having to develop multiple interface formats.

● A single change in data needs to be implemented only once.

● An organization that plugs into the hub immediately connect with every other organization in the network.

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Without PESC expect

● Increased cost of systems, IT, integration.● Increased cost in resources due to serial, redundant

and customized programming for the same data elements.

● Slower response to customer needs.● Increased data mapping which jeopardizes data

quality and integrity.● More difficult access to data.● Repetitive programming if rules, regulations, or

business needs change.

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● While Provinces can set up their own hubs to manage data exchange within a Province, national standards facilitate data exchange across the country or with other countries.

● Peer to peer exchange is possible with national standards.

● But a centralized method for exchanging data is needed as well for all institutions that don’t have or want their own hubs or don’t want a peer to peer model.

● Canada privacy laws prohibit Student data from crossing into US for exchanges within Canada.

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FA

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Admissions

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Challenges

● Broad exchange and transportation of data from one point to another remains unaddressed in higher education.

● There is a significant need for a centralized hub or network that can exchange data standards for Institutions.

● Without a service, Institutions have to search for a mechanism on their own or build it themselves.

● Leaving each entity to build mechanisms on its own is extremely expensive, will take years, and as a result may never actually happen.

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Challenges

● Higher education is far behind other industries in implementation and use of technical standards.

● Think of the value of:● The ATM network● Credit card networks (VISA, Mastercard, AmEx, etc.)● Direct deposit

● K12 and higher education's own standards.

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PESC Mission

● PESC approved financial aid XML standards implemented in every US College and university.

● High School and/or College Transcripts used/implemented in 6 states (CA, GA, IN, NC, OH, VA) and throughout Alberta and Ontario, in pilot phase in BC.

● 18 states plan on implementation within 18-24 months● Data Transport Standard implemented in Alberta, a

handful of colleges, and with National Student Clearinghouse.

● XML College Transcript implemented by SunGard Higher Education.

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Partners

● AACRAO’s SPEEDE Committee – American Association of Collegiate Registrars and Admissions Officers, Standardization of Postsecondary Education Electronic Data Exchange

● DQC / InCommon● SHEEO – State Higher Education Executive Officers● SIF Association● SunGard Higher Education● US Department of Education

– NCES – National Center for Education Statistics– FSA – Office of Federal Student Aid

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Adoption

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EdUnify

● A web service registry/index with a suite of applications built on top of it.

● EdUnify infrastructure allows vendors, academic institutions, and government agencies to register their data interchange specifications.

● Users of EdUnify will be able to use these registry and annotation services to:● Build integrations ● Inventory services● Access data across higher education.

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EdUnify Applications

• Faculty Search for Expertise, Schedule, etc.• Student Search for Enrollment Status• Student Progress Traceback Search• Teacher Traceback Search• Lookup Program and Course Learning Outcomes

and Comparability• Government Agency Data and Information

Collection• Applications for Mobile, Portable, or Wearable

Computer Devices

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http://www.pesc.org

● Standards and Workgroups● PESC Approved Standards

– Admissions Applications– Education Test Score Reporting– IPEDS– Student Aid– Transcripts– Data Transport Specification– Core Main– Sector Libraries

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CoreMain

● CoreMain v1.8.0 xsd

Defines basic types● Person● Organization● Transmission● Employment● Etc..

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CoreMain

● <xs:group name="OrganizationIDGroup">

● <xs:annotation>

● <xs:documentation>Allowable Organization IDs - Exclusive choice. As of January 2009, CSIS and USIS are marked as deprecated and will be removed in a future release</xs:documentation>

● </xs:annotation>

● <xs:choice>

● <xs:element name="OPEID" type="core:OPEIDType"/>

● <xs:element name="NCHELPID" type="core:NCHELPIDType"/>

● <xs:element name="IPEDS" type="core:IPEDSType"/>

● <xs:element name="ATP" type="core:ATPType"/>

● <xs:element name="FICE" type="core:FICEType"/>

● <xs:element name="PSIS" type="core:PSISType"/>

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Admissions Applications

● The Admissions Application standard can be used by any number of organizations to send admissions application data and information to colleges and universities.

● Members Approved:– AACRAO - American Association of Collegiate Registrars &

Admissions Officers– SunGard Higher Education– Datatel, Inc.– Oracle Corporation– Alberta, Ontario Province-wide Admissions– Etc..

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Admissions Applications

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Testscore Reporting

● XSD, Implementation Guides

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Student Aid

● XSD, implementation guides

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Transcripts

● XSD, Implementation guides● AcademicRecord type

– Course– Academic Award– Academic Summary

● High School transcript type● College transcript type● Transcript Request and Response● Transcript Acknowledgement● Transcript Batch

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Transcripts

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Transcripts

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Transcripts

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Transcripts

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Transcript Exchange

● Currently in Pilot in BC● SFU (PeopleSoft system integration)● Kwantlen (Banner system integration)● Douglas College (Banner system integration)

● Hub and spokes model for BC● Last 5 months in Production● Processed 1200 transcripts already● Soon to expand to more institutions

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DTS

● Data Transport Specification● WebService Oriented● Published WSDL● Security aspects including single sign-on

● SIF integration coming soon● SIF has extensive WSDL capabilities● More REST-like

● In its infancy

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EDI

● EDI-PESC Mapping document● EDI Working group within PESC umbrella● SNAP (Statistical Networking Application Project)

for K12 exchanges.

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PESC TAB

● Technical Advisory Board● ACT / SunGard cochairs● The Technical Advisory Board is responsible for

updating and maintaining all technical specifications and for providing guidance on technical and architectural issues related to electronic standards and higher education.

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Conclusion

● PESC provides all standards and information to the education community on its website without charge.

● If your organization is not a member, but you use the site and/or use PESC standards, please consider joining PESC as a member and help share the cost of bringing higher education to a new level of interoperability.