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USIMS team outlines student achievement "backpack," APIs and SIS vendor engagement
Summary
USIMS staff described progress on a student achievement 'backpack' to let student records and assessment scores follow learners across LEAs, published API endpoints for attendance and assessments, and plans to engage SIS vendors for technical integration.
Katrina Brinkley, chief product owner and program manager for USIMS, and Mark Waddupps, product owner for the student domain, presented an update on Utah’s USIMS (Utah School Information Management Structure) student achievement backpack and related APIs.
What the backpack does Mark explained the backpack is a learner‑profile approach intended to make key student data (attendance summaries, assessment scores and select demographics) follow a student when they move between LEAs or SIS systems. The goal is to reduce delays that occur when cumulative files or manual transfers are requested, and give LEAs immediate access to a student's historical assessment and attendance data.
Progress and available endpoints Mark said the team has delivered a summative attendance endpoint and that assessment scores (RISE and Aspire Plus) will be exposed via ED‑Fi formatted APIs. The current focus is on the past year for initial delivery, with plans to add historical records where available and to expand datasets (including special education data and growth measures) over time. He invited LEA technical staff to participate in the student focus working group and to test the endpoints.
SIS vendor engagement and security Katrina summarized meetings with SIS vendors and said the team will hold developer‑facing sessions to present new field requirements (including the S5 fields discussed earlier) and to coordinate timelines. The team is preparing documentation and a token/secret management system so LEAs can obtain secure credentials (tokens) for API access. Vendors that are ED‑Fi certified (for example, PowerSchool and Skyward) may experience a lower integration burden; other vendors will need additional work.
Why it matters: Immediate access to attendance and assessment data can reduce administrative delays when students transfer and can help LEAs better match students to programs. The team plans more documentation and test data for LEAs and vendor partners.
Ending: The USIMS team invited LEA and vendor technical staff to join working groups and to test forthcoming API endpoints; they said more documentation will be released to LEAs in the coming weeks.
