Explore how one school creates data imports, exports, and reporting features without relying on their information technology department. Discuss tips for real world application and foster a community of data.

1. NAVIANCE SUMMER INSTITUTE 2014
PALM SPRINGS, CALIFORNIA

3. NAVIANCE SUMMER INSTITUTE 2014 | PALM SPRINGS, CALIFORNIA
Everyday Data: Empower
Yourself to be an Expert
Tips for setting up data in Naviance
Betsy Stangel
College Coordinator
Mount Carmel Academy
New Orleans, Louisiana
July 16, 2014

4. NAVIANCE SUMMER INSTITUTE 2014 | PALM SPRINGS, CALIFORNIA
How I became my own data guru.

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Our Story
Mount Carmel Academy is a private, all girls school
for grades 8-12 with 1200 students.
We were shut down for a semester in 2005 and
started using Naviance as part of our emergency
preparedness plan.

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Site Supervisor Designation
Because there were a lot of other things going on
in New Orleans in 2006, I was in charge of the
program because everyone thought it was just a
college program to send transcripts.
Based on experiences, I have learned that this
happens to a lot of college counselors.

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Help me help you…
How many of you in this room currently use
Naviance?
• highly skilled?
• medium skilled?
• new to Naviance?
How many of you are site supervisors?
How many of you have no right to import data?

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If you are not the supervisor, you need to…
• Understand what you need as far as data so you
can tell your supervisor what you need.
• Always ask for more data in the system that you
think you may need.
• You will be surprised of ways that you can use
the information.

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If you are the supervisor, lessons for you:
Do not panic. You do not have to be a technical
person.
Do not reach out to your IT person and tell them to
set it up for you.

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Best way to learn is to network
Discuss, and if possible, teach what you do know
and you will be surprised how you can really learn
the system.
The more I networked and volunteered to help
others, the more I knew what to do, learned work
around solutions, and somehow was even accused
of being a secret Naviance employee.

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Networking in New Orleans & Beyond
Use regional ACAC meetings to test out your
knowledge.
Set up area counselor meetings to discuss how
you use the program to learn from each other.
Virtual networking – reach out to those you meet at
NSI and other counselor meetings throughout the
country or on webinars.

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Utilize Naviance Network & Call Center
I cannot stress enough how helpful the support call
center can be at time of setting up data.
Naviance Network articles provide guidance, and
sometimes even handouts.
Posting new ideas on the Naviance Network allows
you to get feedback from others and tell Naviance
at the same time.

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Naviance is not all things to all people
The way that your school uses Naviance may be
different from other schools; however, the one
common thing is that you all will be inputting data.
Only through use of the program and
conversations with others will you start to learn of
ways that you need to adjust the data that you will
need each year.

14. NAVIANCE SUMMER INSTITUTE 2014 | PALM SPRINGS, CALIFORNIA
Understanding Data

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Administrative Data base
All administrative database programs have the
ability to export the data in the various fields to a
commma separated value (csv) format.
This does not require a computer science degree
to understand how it works.

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What is CSV format?
A CSV file consists of any number of records,
separated by line breaks of some kind; each
record consists of fields, separated by some other
character or string, most commonly a literal
comma or tab.
CSV files can be opened in Microsoft excel or the
Mac program called Numbers.

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Some special things to know about CSV
The data will always be saved without special
formatting.
In excel, you can save a file as a CSV format:
Save as
Other formats
CSV

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Exporting Data can be helpful
In addition to importing data for your setup, you
may find that the export feature can also help you.
At a minimum it can help you:
If you have a mistake and have to “fix it,”
and
If you need data in a format that you cannot
achieve in a report.

19. NAVIANCE SUMMER INSTITUTE 2014 | PALM SPRINGS, CALIFORNIA
Collecting Data

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Clarify with administration what you need
If you are not the one with rights to export the data,
ask for the moon.
Note: You may have to obtain the data from
multiple sources.
Examples:
• Demograhic data
• Clubs & Organizations
• GPA
• Test scores
• Photographs

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Understand the importance of Unique IDs
All data must be associated with a unique ID.
This number cannot change, ever.

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Clean history of what you do is helpful
Before you begin any import process, save the file
with data as a read only or save a backup
somewhere. Do not manipulate your original data.
Mistakes sometimes happen and you can easily
erase a mistake and start over, if you have that file.

23. NAVIANCE SUMMER INSTITUTE 2014 | PALM SPRINGS, CALIFORNIA
Other types of data beyond CSV

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Standardized Test Scores
Standardized test score data can be input several
ways.
• Manual input
• CD’s or online data from test services
• Other text file with data
Importing from the test service is desirable, in our
experiences.

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Photograph Data
Please check with the instructions for importing
photographs.
The JPG extension MUST BE IN ALL CAPS
Once you have the data, it installs very easily

26. NAVIANCE SUMMER INSTITUTE 2014 | PALM SPRINGS, CALIFORNIA
Why you need to be your Own guru

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Understand your own needs
This may not happen for a year or two, and may
continually change based on what you use in the
program.
Our school started out not using the parent data,
but we realized that we needed it. No one could
have told us otherwise, we had to learn it on our
own timeline.
This may happen to you with various things along
the way, and it is okay.

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Site Administrator vs. Team
With the various options, may need to delegate
responsibilities, but one person in charge is key to
not having data nightmares.
Our nightmare story about unique ID’s….and why
you do not want this to happen.

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One time import vs. Every Year
One issue that I have is that I have to re-import
demographic data each year from our database.
We have found that to modify addresses, email
addresses, phone numbers, etc. was too difficult to
modify in two different databases, so we update
the main system and at the beginning of the school
year I import the data.
Issues that I see with this…

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Questions?

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Contact Information
Betsy Stangel
College Coordinator
Mount Carmel Academy
New Orleans, Louisiana 70124
bstangel@mcacubs.org
504-288-7626, ext. 213
www.mcacubs.com