This lesson provides an overview on importing your student enrollment data into DnA.
About Enrollment Data
The Enrollment import creates and updates student enrollment records in DnA. The enrollment file should reflect all student enrollment records for a student within a given academic year.
About Importing Enrollment
The enrollment.txt file is the process by which student enrollment records are loaded into DnA. In DnA Data and Assessment (DnA) or DnA Special Education (ISE) this file is a key component of the regular data automation. For DnA Student Information (ISI) the enrollment.txt file is used to load historical enrollment data. For both DnA and ISI, it is the ONLY way that students are placed into schools. Without data in the enrollment.txt file, the students will not be in a school.
The unique key on an enrollment record is: Import Student Id, Site ID, Enrollment Start, and Academic Year. These 4 fields together are what constitute a unique enrollment record.
Required Fields
- Import Student ID
- Student Last Name
- Student First Name
- Birth Date
- Site ID
- Enrollment Start
- Grade Level ID
- Academic Year
Import Student ID is the key identifier for this dataset. The Import Student ID should be a unique value for each student. It is not required that the value is the Student Information System (SIS) ID. It is required that for the entire installation the value is guaranteed to be unique. Traditionally, in a single district instance, the Import Student ID is the SIS generated student ID. In installations that span multiple districts, such as a consortium or a county, the Import Student ID is usually the State Student ID because this value is expected to be unique across multiple SIS.
Student Last Name, Student First Name, and Birth Date are actually soft requirements within this dataset. It is expected that every student should have these four basic data elements available in this file. In the enrollment.txt file, these fields are only used to assist in troubleshooting data. Ensuring that the data is available in the file allows for more efficient troubleshooting when reviewing import logs. This data is required to be present in the import file, however, the fields are not imported. These fields are updated only through the studemo.txt import.
Site ID is the internal identifier of the site to which the student is enrolled. The site ID in this file must align to the site IDs that were originally provided in the sites.txt import file when the system was originally set up.
Enrollment Start identifies the date that the student was first actively enrolled at the site. It is important to note that in DnA, the enrollment date should represent the student's first day of activity. If the first in session school date is 09-01-2016, the students Enrollment Start is expected to be 09-01-2016. Enrollment dates cannot exist outside of term start and end dates. If the provided Enrollment Start pre-dates the session start date as identified in the term setup, the date will default to the term start date.
Grade Level ID is used to identify a student's grade level. Currently, in the import processes, it is expected that the Grade Level ID aligns to DnAs internal grade level ID sequencing. This is frequently confusing and not ideal, however it is how the imports currently work. This will be addressed in the future, however, for now it is important to know how the Grade Level IDs should be provided. See below in the Common Issues section of this document for more information.
Academic Year is currently required to identify the academic year to which the student data belongs. Generally, after historic data loads and for regular automation, the Academic Year field simply identifies the current academic year. The data, as stated in the spec, should be represented as a hyphenated two year range such as: 2016-2017.
If any of the required fields are not provided or if any of the required fields do not align to the designated field types or values, the entire record will not import. Problems with required fields will generate import errors.
Whether or not a field is required refers to basic, minimal operation of the system. With only the required fields your DnA installation will work, however, it will not be configured optimally. Additionally, beyond minimal functionality and basic reporting, in an DnA Student Information (ISI) installation as much data as can possibly be provided should be imported. Many non-required fields are used in basic reports and compliance reporting.
Non-Required but Highly Recommended Fields
- State Student ID
- Enrollment End
- Enrollment Exit Code
State Student ID is the students unique identifier for state data reporting. It is used extensively as an alternate identifier for students. It is strongly recommended that this information is provided. In this import this ID is used solely for troubleshooting and student identifying information. It is not updated or imported from this file. It is only updated or importing via the studemo.txt import.
Enrollment End and Enrollment Exit Code are help to identify when and why a student may have ended their enrollment at a particular site. The Enrollment End cannot be before the Enrollment Start and it also cannot post date the term end dates for the given site. If the Enrollment End is not provided, it is assumed that the students enrollment lasts the duration of the school year. The Enrollment End should represent the last date that the student was present or expected to be present. The Enrollment Exit Code should be a code value and it must align to the codes in the Exit Codes code table.
Non-Required Fields
- Student Middle Name
- Is Primary ADA
- Attendance Category
- Session Type
- Enrollment Entry Code
Common Issues
This often occurs because traditional alphanumeric grades are provided to DnA. For example, in the incoming data file grade levels are provided as K, 1, 2, ...12. For importing into DnA, theGrade Level IDmust align to the specific codes provided in the data specification. If theGrade Level IDs are not provided in the correct format as required for import, student grade levels will be out of alignment. There are only two options to properly align student grade levels: provide the data as required according to the spec or introduce a transformation to theGrade Level IDfield in the import configuration.
Term dates are the foundation for setting up calendars. Terms identify when school starts and ends. In DnA, term dates are very important and are taken literally. If a school starts on 09-01-2016, as indicated by term dates, then it is impossible for students to be enrolled prior to that date. Likewise, if term dates indicate that school ends on 06-01-2017, then it is impossible for students to end enrollment after that date. It is imperative that incoming data is aligned to term dates. Also, students cannot end enrollment before they begin enrollment. Frequently enrollment data is provided where the Enrollment End predates the Enrollment Start. This creates a technical impossibility and the records are rejected.
Student enrollment is expected to be clear of any date overlaps. Technically, a student should not have two primary enrollment records. If data is provided that enrolls a student at a new site while they have an open enrollment at a current site, an overlap exception occurs. Incoming data is evaluated against data that is already in DnA for a student. For all incoming data, ensure that Enrollment Start and Enrollment End dates are in alignment for all students for an individual academic year.
Next Steps
Want to review your data for accuracy? Visit our Enrollment.txt data Accuracy and Validation guide.