PIMS Overview

PIMS, or the Pennsylvania Information Management System, is PDE’s data collection and enterprise-wide longitudinal data warehouse and reporting system. It is designed to improve student achievement through more efficient and effective use of data. PIMS was first implemented during the 2007-2008 school year to the 501 public school districts and 232 other preK-12 educational agencies (collectively these are referred to as local education agencies, or LEAs) throughout the Commonwealth. PIMS for preK-12 serves many purposes, including:

·        Meeting the current PDE and federal reporting requirements

·        Improving education decision-making through the use of high quality data and decision support tools

·        Providing longitudinal tracking of particular individual and subgroup education progress over time and across LEAs

·        Reporting timely and accurate education data through standardized and ad hoc reporting capabilities

To meet these objectives PIMS is currently collecting and storing comprehensive and detailed-level data from the LEAs. This includes:

·        Student demographics and program participation

·        Courses and sections offered

·        Students enrolled in course sections

·        Student Pennsylvania System of School Assessment (PSSA) and Pennsylvania Alternate System of Assessment (PASA) results

·        Staff demographics and assignments

PIMS Expansion to Postsecondary

Pennsylvania began the process of expanding PIMS to the postsecondary sector in 2008. The first step towards longitudinal data was the assignment of the unique and consistent PAsecureID student identifier. During fall 2008, 65 community colleges, Pennsylvania State System of Higher Education (PASSHE) universities and private institutions that receive grant money from PDE were trained on the generation of these identifiers.

Also during fall 2008 PDE developed a detailed postsecondary dictionary of data elements to be added to PIMS. This data dictionary was formed based on input from:

·        PDE postsecondary leaders and program owners

·        The Postsecondary Statewide Data Council (PSDC), an advisory group consisting of select individuals knowledgeable about data and data systems representing the community colleges and PASSHE universities

·        A National Advisory Group that consists of national experts in longitudinal data collections, analysis and postsecondary research

Based on this postsecondary data dictionary, a new version of PIMS for postsecondary was developed and released in March 2009. This new version includes 29 postsecondary-specific data templates (extract file specifications) covering subject areas such as institutional and campus characteristics, student demographics and enrollment, courses, financial aid, transfers, etc.

To test the data definitions developed and to gauge the readiness of institutions to submit data in the desired format, PDE conducted a pilot implementation of the PIMS for Postsecondary data warehouse to a select group of institutions in May 2009. This pilot included the submission of student demographic, enrollment, high school background and transfer data. Over 100,000 student records were submitted during this highly successful pilot.

In December 2009 PDE implemented PIMS for Postsecondary to all 14 PASSHE universities, all 14 community colleges and two private institutions. These institutions submitted student demographic and enrollment data on all of their undergraduate for-credit students in addition to institutional-level data such as degrees and programs offered, tuition and fees, etc. Approximately 250,000 student records were submitted.

PDE plans to continue to expand PIMS for Postsecondary, both from the perspective of data collected and institutions participating. For example, plans for the spring 2010 end of term submission call for the data collected from the existing institutions to be expanded to include courses taken and financial aid. Additionally, during the summer and fall of 2010 PDE expects to greatly expand the number of institutions submitting to PIMS. Institutions offering or participating in the Act 101 program, Perkins career and technical programs, the Transfer and Articulation program and/or Title II teacher preparation programs will be submitting these student populations to PIMS.

Including the postsecondary data within PIMS means that PDE now has a single centralized student-level longitudinal data system covering pre-Kindergarten through postsecondary undergraduate education. Using this rich data, PDE, postsecondary institutions, preK-12 LEAs and other stakeholders will be able to develop a better understanding of how high school graduates are performing in postsecondary education, and to identify as well the predictors of such important outcomes as admission, retention, transfer and graduation.