Achievement In Montana

The Office of Public Instruction (OPI) released RFP06-1203O on November 16, 2005 and signed a contract with education software vendor, Infinite Campus, to purchase and make the necessary adjustments to their State Edition.  All State Edition application upgrades and patches are included through June 30, 2007.  We have named this system AIM, which stands for Achievement in Montana.  This system will streamline the reporting of student-related data from school districts to OPI, including enrollment, demographic data, eligibility for state and federal education programs, registration for the statewide assessments, and special education planning and reporting.  Components within the AIM system include:

AIM will track a wide variety of student information including:

• enrollment and demographic information for all students attending Montana public schools;
• scores on statewide assessments;
• information for determining a school's 'Adequate Yearly Progress Report" required by the No Child Left Behind Act;
• student dropout information;
• information needed for serving students with disabilities; and
• participation of students in federal and state grant programs.

The Special Education Records portion of this system will be fully integrated with AIM and will:

• manage student and staff information;
• support teachers in completing special education paperwork demands;
• document decisions made during the Child Study Team (CST) meetings;
• develop and maintain individualized education plans (IEP) as well as additional documentation for students receiving special education and/or related services;
• improve compliance with state and federal regulations; and
• reduce time and effort of teachers when completing required reports for special education.

The AIM system will also provide tools to enable:

• interactive querying and reporting of the data in an integrated fashion;
• data driven decision making by state-level education staff and policy makers to meet increasing state and federal reporting requirements; and
• stakeholders at all levels of education to make informed educational decisions based on accurate and timely information

Timeline ...

The tentative timeline for the AIM project:

AIM Project Update, August 21, 2007

AIM Student Identifiers
OPI is pleased to report that, in partnership with Montana school districts, we have made good progress in the first phase of implementing the new Achievement in Montana (AIM) system. As of December 20, 2006, student identifiers have been assigned to more than 144,000 K-12 students (approximately 99% of total K-12 enrollment).

AIM Assessment Pre-Label Collection and Training
The student enrollment information for registering students for the MontCAS Criterion-Referenced Test (CRT) is underway.  This collection referred to as the "Assessment Pre-Label Collection" and is taking place from December 1, 2006, to January 5, 2007.  This data collection replaces the requirement that districts submit student enrollment files to Measured Progress.  Please note that districts will need to submit counts of the number of students that are expected to take the CRT-Alternate to Measured Progress.  As of January 4, 2006, Assessment Pre-Label Collection has been assigned to over 73,000 K-12 students (approximately 50% of total K-12 enrollment).

Tutorials for uploading or direct entry of your data as well as file specifications and an Excel template for file upload can be found on the OPI website at under the "Training and Instructions" tab at http://opi.mt.gov/ITProjects/AIM.html.

  

OPI Contacts:

AIM Help Desk - For data questions and general instructions:
Nicole Weissman
Student Records System Manager
(406) 444-3495
nweissman@mt.gov

Sara Loewen
Data Resource Administrator
(406) 444-3494
sloewen@mt.gov

Password Information:
OPI HELP DESK (406) 444-3448

Information Technology Project Manager
Dave Nagel
(406) 444-1641
dnagel@mt.gov

Infinite Campus Contacts:

Infinite Campus Help Desk - For technical questions related to software and browser issues:
IC HELP DESK 888-461-2004

Infinite Campus Project Manager
David Van Meter
dvanmeter@infinitecampus.com