The Hidden Costs of Disparate K-12 IT Systems

Few, if any, K-12 school systems have the luxury of purchasing a complete IT infrastructure system all at once so that it’s perfectly integrated from the start. Instead, most districts add IT components gradually as their budgets allow. During this slow build up, technology evolves, district leadership and staff change, and the district’s needs change. Even with careful management, IT infrastructure can become burdened with disparate systems, needlessly redundant functions, and shelfware. 

Sometimes the additional costs of dysfunctional IT architecture are apparent, such as time wasted on repetitive, manual data entry because certain systems cannot exchange data automatically. However, many other costs aren’t so obvious. The true cost of disparate IT systems — in money and in time — can be challenging to measure. However, making the effort to uncover how your IT systems may be needlessly compromising cost-effectiveness and quality is valuable. It’s the first step in addressing the root causes of these hidden costs so you can make better decisions going forward. 

This whitepaper uncovers the hidden costs of disparate K-12 IT systems and outlines ways to reduce these costs within IT systems management, business operations (back-office) functions, and classrooms.