• Introduction
• Standard Data Elements and Definitions
• Recommendations for Building an Automated Staff Accounting System
• Focus on State and Local Staff Record Applications
• References to Other Related Documents
• Organization of the Handbook
• Reference

To make appropriate, cost-effective, and timely decisions about staff, educators must have accurate and complete information. Recognizing this need, most education systems have moved from paper documents in filing cabinets to automated staff accounting systems. These systems provide administrators and others concerned with effective program design with day-to-day access to information about staffs’ background, qualifications, and assignments. They also provide the flexibility necessary to supply aggregate data to school boards, state and federal governments, and other interested parties and to conduct program evaluations. To be effective, however, these systems must record data accurately and comparably for all staff members, in all places, and at all times.

The Staff Data Handbook for Elementary, Secondary, and Early Childhood Education was developed by the U.S. Department of Education’s National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) to provide guidance concerning the consistent maintenance of staff information. This handbook is useful to public and private education agencies, schools, early childhood centers, and other institutions, as well as to researchers involved in the collection of staff data. In addition, the Handbook may be useful to elected officials and members of the public interested in staff information. This handbook is not, however, a data collection instrument, nor does it reflect any type of federal data maintenance requirements. It is presented as a tool to help the public and American school systems make information about staff more useful and effective in meeting student needs.

This handbook was developed with the assistance of local, state, national, and most federal education representatives and researchers. The definitions included are generally consistent with current state and local practice, national standards movements, and most federal reporting requirements. The terms, definitions, and procedures represent a consensus of what is considered “best practice” in data collection; they should be interpreted and applied according to local, state, and federal reporting requirements and restrictions for confidentiality and security.

The data elements included in this handbook represent the types of staff information that could be collected and maintained in permanent or temporary staff records, whether in paper format or in an automated database. An attempt has been made to be as complete as possible, with the understanding that many data elements will not be needed for all staff members.

Data elements are presented in seven areas:

• personal information;
• educational experiences;
• qualification information;
• current employment;
• assignments;
• evaluation and career development; and
• separation from employment.

Each data element is defined, and lists of options and definitions are included where applicable. Data elements are also associated with the entities to which they pertain, such as persons, places, or things, about which data may be stored.

This handbook provides guidelines for designing automated staff accounting systems for use by schools, school districts, state education agencies, and other institutions. Included is a discussion of the benefits of a well-designed staff accounting system, as well as the potential uses of such a system at the school, district, and state levels. Also included is a description of a step-by-step process for designing an effective staff accounting system.

Communication among various levels of the education system is increasingly important. A well-designed automated staff accounting system allows for the easy and efficient movement of staff records among levels of the education system. For instance, information on teacher licensure could be transmitted electronically to school districts seeking to hire an educator. Similarly, when a school employee retires, data could be efficiently transferred to the retirement system. This revision of the Handbook adds detail about automating and exchanging electronic records, with suggestions for formatting data elements and arranging them in a logical and flexible design.

This handbook, in conjunction with other NCES documents, provides state and local education officials with important tools for designing and implementing automated information systems. Recent NCES documents dealing with the confidentiality of staff records, decisionmaking about the installation of technology, and ensuring security of technology are important adjuncts to this handbook. The Handbook lists and discusses these related documents.

Chapter 1 provides the user with an introduction to the Handbook and its uses.

Chapter 2 contains a more detailed description of the Handbook’s contents and uses. Listings of other related documents that could be useful are also included. In anticipation of future updates to the Handbook, a description of the process for implementing suggested changes has been included.

Chapter 3, “Building a Staff Accounting System,” discusses the collection, use, and dissemination of data and information about individual staff members and how staff accounting systems can benefit the staff and the school system.

Chapter 4, “Data Elements and Definitions,” contains data elements and definitions that describe staff members, assignments, educational background, activities in which they participate, and other information that could be maintained about an individual staff member. Each entity listed refers to something, or someone, about which data should be maintained. Each data element refers to a particular aspect of staff data for which some need was perceived within the school system. A definition is included for each entity and data element.

Chapter 5 describes possible applications of the Handbook. A table is provided that includes information about data element type and field length, attributes that could be useful to readers designing a data collection system, a survey, or a reporting format.

Following the glossary and index are 14 appendices that contain important supplemental information. The appendices include comprehensive lists of coding options for some of the data elements in chapter 4. Included are code designations for states and outlying areas, countries, languages, occupational groupings, medical conditions and treatments, and education programs. Also included are a crosswalk of data elements in both the Staff Data Handbook and the Student Data Handbook (Cheung and Young 2000) and the names of those who contributed to the development of this revision of the Staff Data Handbook.