4 Keys to a Smooth K-12 SIS Implementation

When it comes to switching K-12 student information systems, the associated change management can be both challenging and stressful. But if you plan well and choose the right SIS partner with experience and support throughout the process, you can experience a smooth implementation that benefits both your staff and students. 

Epic Charter Schools, one of Oklahoma’s largest public school systems, had to act fast to implement a new student information system. Its current SIS was a homegrown system created by its outgoing management team, so Epic Charter Schools was going to lose access at the end of May 2021. Epic, with an enrollment of 40,000 students and counting, had an extremely aggressive deadline, beginning conversations with vendors on April 27, 2021, and ultimately implementing PowerSchool SIS in early June. 

Roger Kimball, Epic’s Deputy Superintendent of Technology for the past eight years, knew he was facing a significant feat. Implementing a student information system for an organization of Epic’s size can take many months. The decision would ultimately come down to choosing an SIS vendor that could confidently meet the aggressive timeline. Epic’s team needed to choose a vendor who would be a true partner and who could hit the ground running from day one. 

They chose PowerSchool, who they felt was the right partner to successfully meet their challenge. Communication, setting expectations, and a true partnership relationship proved to be the keys to implementation success.

“Communication is key to everything, but it was very key to this that we be heard, that PowerSchool heard us loud and clear on what we needed, when we needed it, and being able to keep the timelines,” says Kimball. 

While SIS implementation timelines vary, there are steadfast ways to ensure your school or district is set up for success. We know change can be hard, especially in the past two years of constant challenges and evolution of learning, software needs, and life in general.

We’ve met with customers and vendor implementation staff to get their insights into SIS change management and what has helped them with successful implementations. Based on those conversations, here are 4 ways to ensure a smooth SIS implementation and help make it as easy as possible for everyone involved.

1) Create a Plan and Define Expectations 

Our conversations with customers and vendor implementation staff consistently yield the same advice: a strong project plan from the very beginning sets the tone and expectations for the entire implementation. The plan should establish the timeline and milestones, spell out communication expectations, define risks, identify deliverables, and clarify action ownership. Choosing a vendor with a strong project management organization and application specialists is key. 

Andy Black, a former director of innovation at a large charter management organization and now a deployment solutions supervisor at PowerSchool, states, “The project manager will be that consistent person who makes sure all the different teams that are involved are working together, that all the timelines are meeting your expectations. They are that glue that holds it all together.” 

In relation to his district’s recent PowerSchool SIS implementation, Osiris Gonzalez, director of IT at Randolph Public Schools, says, “I felt that the implementation project manager and also the implementation expert, hands down, worked like a great team, a well-oiled machine. We were able to get to a really good place because of their help. They are the reason why I wake up in the morning and come into work and have a smile every time I log into PowerSchool.”

2) Identify Key Stakeholders and Set Up the Partnership

Implementation should be a true partnership. Some vendors will tout being able to take the implementation “off your hands,” but a strong project partnership between vendor and customer ensures a successful result.

Start by identifying the appropriate district stakeholders to participate in the implementation project. It should be someone (or a team) who: 

• Knows what data is required 
• Will gather it beforehand 
• Can discuss what other integrations need to be considered as part of the implementation

“The most successful implementations occur when the district stakeholders for the different parts of the implementation have been identified before you get into the implementation,” says Michael Pietrzak, former technology coordinator at The Diocese of Wichita and now a senior application specialist and SIS deployment team leader at PowerSchool. “And whoever the district project lead is, needs to be in communication with those stakeholders for the different parts.”

Whoever works on the implementation from the district needs to be able to make decisions about data standardization. Otherwise, if you bring in bad data, you will have to move forward with that bad data. Ultimately, it needs to be the district’s decision as the data owner and the authority on their compliance needs. This showcases why partnership is the best route for success. A strong project partnership between vendor and customer ensures the end result is exactly what the district is looking for, as they had a key voice in setting out the requirements.  

Ideas for starting off the partnership and setting priorities include having whiteboarding sessions, onsite if possible, where everyone is in a room together. Or consider a focus group, rank project priorities as “must have, nice to have, absolutely required for compliance,” and so on.  

While a true partnership does require significant commitment and effort on the district’s end, all the customers we spoke with agreed it was the best path to setting up the SIS and users for long-term success.

3) Choose a Vendor with Depth of Expertise

An SIS implementation is no easy undertaking, so working with implementation specialists with a high level of expertise is paramount. Ask prospective vendors questions relevant to your organization, such as: how many years of experience their specialists have in implementing an SIS; the types and sizes of schools and districts where they’ve implemented; what solutions do they have direct experience with; and what to expect from the overall process.

Find out if any of them worked at school districts in the past, and if so, what was their role and responsibilities. Former tech directors can be the ideal implementation specialists. They have worked in schools and have worked in your similar positions and will have a level of on-the-job understanding. This helps them lead the implementation process in a more methodical, project management-focused way that ultimately leads to better success.

Andrea Stetson, a deployment solutions supervisor at PowerSchool, reiterates the value placed on this expertise, stating, “Probably, on our team, everybody, between PowerSchool and their SIS, has at least a decade of experience.”

4) Leverage Ongoing Support Resources 

While a vendor ideally should leave you well-equipped upon implementation wrap-up, there will always be more to learn or refresh on. Ensure that you choose an SIS with strong support measures in place, including support resources from the vendor as well as an active user community you can rely on for ongoing peer help.

On the vendor side, look for an implementation plan that focuses on reviewing all major aspects of your new SIS before handing off the support. And once in support, customers should expect robust resources available to continue learning as they go.

“I am in Support and looking at documentation almost every day,” says Gonzalez on his post-implementation support.

Additional training, such as train-the trainer, self-paced online, and vendor-hosted live trainings should be offered.

On the user side, a strong network of peers is key. Pietrzak thinks back to his time as a PowerSchool SIS customer and says, “If I had a question, I knew I probably wasn’t the only person who had that question. I could pick the phone up and call another user or go to a regular meeting or a forum to discuss.” 

A Proven Implementation Approach Ensures Success when You Choose PowerSchool SIS 

The student information system is the heart of your education ecosystem, and the data it houses is critical to the success, safety, and funding of students and staff. PowerSchool offers a true partnership implementation methodology that will ensure a smooth roll-out of your PowerSchool SIS and set you up for success for years to come.

“The best thing about it is, it is a guided implementation. We are here every step of the way, and we can tailor your implementation to meet your needs,” says Stetson. “You will know right up front from meeting one what your timeline looks like, what the expectations are from both sides, and we approach it truly as a partnership. Everybody is focused on the success of that implementation.” 

Whether you wish to implement all the robust features right away, or roll out some of the features over time, PowerSchool offers a tailored, guided approach where we will work with you, hand-in-hand, each step of the way. PowerSchool brings a high level of expertise to give you confidence. The majority of our application specialists are former district technology leaders who bring valuable experience and best practices to their roles. The level of documentation we provide access to from day one, coupled with one of the largest and most active SIS user communities in K-12, enables you to continue learning and enhancing your use of PowerSchool SIS. 

“Throughout the implementation process, we provide best practices, documentation, sets of instructions, access to professional development, and training. That information is phenomenal,” says Pieterzak. “When it comes to change management, any change from one SIS to another is going to be stressful, but knowing that those different products and those different pieces are there will help alleviate that stress.”  

About the Author  

Maddie Bala is the Senior Director of Solution Marketing at PowerSchool for the Student Information System and Enrollment lines of business. Maddie has spent her entire career in education, starting as an elementary school music teacher and eventually transitioning to a career in education technology. Maddie has been with PowerSchool for seven years and has held roles in Sales, Solution Engineering, and Marketing. Maddie considers herself to be a connector and relationship-builder whose key strength is inspiring others around the products and solutions she represents.