US Education School Finance Grant

The three primary goals of the USED School Finance Grant are as follows:

1. Revamp the NH Chart of Accounts and Improve Data Standardization: The New Hampshire Local Education Agency handbook was last revised in 2002. Since then, the federal accounting handbook has been modified, Government Accounting Standards Board has made several changes to government accounting practices, and New Hampshire's education system has made significant structural changes. New Hampshire has done some substantial planning work to initiate this project but requires additional resources to fully modernize our chart of accounts and ensure all stakeholders using education financial systems are consistent in practice and implementation.
    
2. Build Robust and Flexible Financial Data Collection System: New Hampshire currently requires districts to input data from their general ledger into an Excel template for upload. After upload, we have manual data validation processes but are in the early stages of building automation into the system to streamline and improve the effectiveness of the review process. The new build for a data system would allow for more granular data collection that better matches and links to local education agency's general ledgers. Validation would be substantially automated and expanded by increasing the linkage of finance data with other internal and external data systems, allowing more time for State staff and district staff to focus on better understanding and utilizing their data instead of entering and reviewing duplicate data entry.
    
3. Better Integrate and Increase Depth of Finance Analytical Tools: New Hampshire has some useful reporting functionality in our data system used to publish the School Report Card, which meets requirements under ESSA. However, after implementing a modernized, standardized, and more efficient school finance data collection system, better integrating school finance data into our existing platform will add an additional level of depth and usefulness. Users of our system sometimes feel limited by the level of drill-down or get overwhelmed by the data. The focus of this phase of the project would bring in the more detailed data to decrease limitations but also increase functionality and usability of our analytic tools. Different stakeholders have different data needs and expertise, the increased integration would expand the scope of review skilled analysts could perform. However, we would also seek to build dashboards with more drill-down capabilities to introduce novice stakeholders to the school finance policy arena while increasing functionality and tansparency for all stakeholders.