Advocacy & Guiding Principles
Powered by the strength and expertise of volunteers from its membership base, PESC maintains a trusting, open and transparent environment. We call it COOPETITION - that is cooperation among competitors...for the greater common good of student achievement. With this unique community perspective, together we are breaking down costly, proprietary barriers, and we have mapped out a common, strategic path for the future.
This path includes continued development of common data standards, establishment and support of data networks and infrastructure, common authentication and web services protocols enterprise-wide, seamless connections bridging postsecondary education systems to secondary and labor and workforce systems, and an eye on emerging technologies like social networking.
Together we are not only helping students across the country and all over the world, but with transparent collaboration as our cornerstone principle, we are supplying state administrators and government officials, researchers, CIOs, admissions officers, registrars, financial aid officers and architects the tools they need to do their jobs better.
The political will and demand for improvement have never been greater and continue to increase with time as budgets tighten and common solutions like standardization are being viewed as wise, cost-saving investments.
With membership from all leading stakeholders in higher education, PESC serves as the umbrella organization to coordinate and advocate for student-centric data standardization and interoperability across education. We boldly accept that mission and work diligently to continue our proven record of success and achievement. We now elevate the mission to the next level.
April 27, 2012
First Seals of Approval Awarded by PESC to ConnectEDU, Inc and Parchment Inc April 10, 2012
Internet2 President & CEO H. David Lambert to Keynote PESC Spring 2012 Data Summit January 27, 2012
NSLDS Enrollment Reporting Approved Through PESC as Education Community Data Standard
October 26, 2011
Canadian PESC User Group Links International Interests While Maintaining "One Standard"September 21, 2011
Inter-Organizational Task Force Common Data Services (CDS) to Launch at PESC Fall 2011 Data SummitSeptember 19, 2011
NCES Announces FY12 SLDS Grants - Request for ApplicationSeptember 13, 2011
Pilot Project - Streamlining Admissions with PESC & InCommonSeptember 7, 2011
University of California System CIO David J. Ernst to Keynote PESC Fall 2011 Data SummitAugust 31, 2011
InCommon and PESC Announce Strategic PartnershipMay 24, 2011
PESC Launches Seal of Approval ProgramMarch 23, 2011
South Carolina Transfer & Articulation Center Wins PESC 12th Annual Best Practices CompetitionFebruary 16, 2011
PK20 Perspective Drives Technology & Standards at PESC Spring 2011 Data SummitFebruary 7, 2011
IPEDS 12 Month Enrollment and Completions & Global PDF Attachment Now PESC Approved Standards
Support the Mission
PESC is funded almost entirely by its sponsors and the dues of its members. Together we believe that every barrier to achieving interoperability that can be eliminated should be eliminated. In keeping with the spirit of this belief, all standards and information are provided to the education community on this website without barrier and without charge.
If your organization is not currently a sponsor or a member of PESC, but you use this site and/or use PESC Approved Standards, please consider sponsoring or joining as a member and help us share the cost of bringing education to a new level of interoperability.
Thank you for your continued support of PESC.
"In California's Community College System, we're implementing the PESC XML Postsecondary Transcript. It will save us time and most importantly resources and money. We are looking for one way to process transcripts and this will be it."
-Catherine McKenzie
Project Coordinator for the Chancellor's Office
California Community Colleges
"Systems must be designed to meet the standards and guidelines of NCES ...including the schemas of PESC."
-Grant RFA for Statewide Longitudinal Data Systems
American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) of 2009
"Embrace common standards and data systems so we can know where we stand and how to move forward."
-Bill Gates
Chair, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation
In the eleven states of MHEC, "schools not only save time and can improve processes, but also recoup an estimated $6.70 per paper-based transcript processed (according to NCES study on cost per transcript to secondary/ postsecondary schools). With an average of 6 transcripts per student being requested, that adds up to over $40 per college bound student. Postsecondary institutions will also see a savings, calculated at over $9 per incoming high school transcript."
-From MHEC's e-Transcript Initiative
PESC is working to become the voice for the efficient and secure real-time exchange of student data from initial access of the student from high school into the college environment through successful completion of the education experience.
PESC is driving the open, transparent, community-based, collaborative development and alignment of data across disparate systems and across sectors; and the elimination of incompatible interfaces that present operational and financial barriers to students, and as hidden expenses, inflate costs for institutions and states struggling to keep up with the demands of technology while maintaining competitive tuition rates.
PESC is building a core competency in XML architecture and data modeling, web services and service oriented architecture (SOA), federations and cloud-based data services, data standards & exchange & overall interoperability; and provides the infrastructure by serving as a standards-setting body for education.
PESC is collaborating throughout all of education to seek out strong partnerships with leading public and private stakeholders to identify tools and best practices and proven sustainable solutions for adoption and implementation.
