DWA Team News - May 2003

Curious about what's happening with the DWA project? Check this page for regular updates from Denis Dolbey, Barbara Jarrold, and Debbie Foster, project managers of the DWA Student, Human Resources, and Financial teams.

• DWA-Student team news
• DWA-Human Resources team news
• DWA-Financial team news
  
  
• DWA Newsletter - April 2003
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DWA-Student team news

Hello from your DWA Student Information Systems Team!

The news is great from your DWA-SIS team. The project is proceeding according to plan and as promised in the first status report. Many of the modifications that will be required to Zangle have now been designed and those designs have been approved by the appropriate subject matter experts. Some programming has also begun or been completed, including the English Learner module which is scheduled for release in August, and the interface connecting Zangle and 4GL (our special education software). Another important piece of the project which is now completed is the Zangle Training Plan.

The next major event for the project is pilot school training which will go on throughout the month of May. (The pilot schools are: University City High School, Standley Middle School, Curie Elementary, Doyle Elementary, Spreckels Elementary, Garfield High School [atypical], and Twain Sr. High [atypical].) Two key staff members, Project Resource Teachers, have been added to the project since the first of April to develop and provide all site training throughout the life of the project. Peyri Ingrum came to the project from Grant Elementary School where she was a math resource teacher and a 5th grade teacher. Scott Irwin came to the project from the Creative Performing Media Arts (CPMA) Middle School where he was the magnet resource teacher. We are excited to have them on the team; we've seen innovative curriculum and materials being developed.

The pilot schools will receive initial training on the general features of Zangle, enrollment procedures, master schedule building/scheduling of students, and the use of the behavior/discipline module and health module. This first month will provide the site with the essential skills necessary to open school in September. When pilot site staff returns in August, our trainers will present information on attendance procedures and train all teachers at the sites in the use of TeacherConnection, Zangle's web-base program for teachers to take attendance and grade reporting.

We will be sharing more information about the SIS Project in the months ahead,

Denis Dolbey
DWA-SIS Project Manager

 

DWA-Human Resources team news

This is an exciting time for the DWA HR project team as we enter the solution development/design phase of the project.

Our team members, led by Empower Solutions, have completed the "business fit" sessions, identifying HR current business practices, redundancies, and compliance issues and how they will work in the new PeopleSoft HCM application. This information will be our "roadmap" as we work with all team members to develop a restructure of our current business practices in order to greatly improve our services. These changes will promote consistent business standards, increased team development and role-based efficient workflow processes.

During April and May, the team is also working on the following projects:

Team committees are working to address the following areas:
· Paycheck development
· Form revision
· Timecard development
· Employee calendar standards
· Position title review
· Job code review
· Salary advancement review
· System date reviews
· Workflow processing
· Sick leave processing

Additionally the team members are working on:
· Data cleansing
· Interfaces
· Reports
· Mandatory modifications to the system
· Portal page development
· Training Plan
· Champion meetings

The HR team commitment is to Inform you, involve you, support you and succeed with you.

We look forward to sharing the outcome of our solution development and design plans. Talk with you again real soon!

Barbara Jarrold
DWA HR Project Manager

DWA-Financial team news

Hello from the DWA Financial Team,

It is great to see the enthusiasm build as more and more district staff become involved in the PeopleSoft implementation.

The district's implementation partner, Empower Solutions, has spent the last several weeks leading district subject matter experts through Fit Gap Sessions to pull our required processes together with PeopleSoft Financials Software. It has been an exercise in determining what we must do to make our processes the most efficient business practices.

Here are a few things we are working on:

· Budget Development Process
· Training Plan
· Chart of Accounts Structure
· Replacement of Assignment Authorization Form
· Moving paper forms to be available on-line
· Position Management
· Data Cleansing
· Reports
· Portal Page Development
· Mandatory modification to the system
· Champion meetings

The project is on schedule and moving full speed ahead. Thank you to all for your involvement and support in the project.

Debbie Foster
DWA Financial Project Manager