PESATD-SOW-2009-F.docx

PERFORMANCE WORK STATEMENT

SUPPORT FOR POSTSECONDARY EDUCATION STATISTICAL ANALYSES AND DATA COLLECTION

I.INTRODUCTION

A. Purpose

The U.S. Department of Education’s (ED), Institute of Education Sciences (IES) [National Center of Education Statistics (NCES)/Postsecondary Studies Division (PSD)] and Office of Postsecondary Education (OPE) intend to award a 60 month contract to support postsecondary data collection and data analysis. The contract will provide support for the National Education Data Resource Center (NEDRC), Maintenance and Updating of the National Postsecondary Education Cooperative’s Website (NPEC), a statistical report on the average cost per postsecondary completion by field of study, and data collection for the Campus Crime Survey, Equity in Athletics Disclosure Act Survey and School Accreditation List.

B. Background

Section 406 (b) of the General Education Provision Acts mandates that NCES

“Shall collect and disseminate statistics and other data related to education in the United States and in other nations. The Center shall... collect, collate, and from time to time, report full and complete statistics on the condition of education in the United States; conduct and publish reports on specialized analyses of the meaning and significance of such statistics

In order to fulfill this mandate, NCES includes 4 major divisions, each of which is devoted to a specific area of education statistics. The divisions include the Postsecondary Studies Division (PSD), the Assessment Division (AD), the Elementary and Secondary Education Studies Division (ELSEC), and the International and Cross Cutting Studies Division (ICSD). The Postsecondary Studies Division is responsible for postsecondary education data collection and analysis. The major data collections of PSD include the Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS) and the Postsecondary Sample Surveys. IPEDS consists of a series of surveys of all Title IV postsecondary institutions on topics including enrollment, institutional characteristics, institutional finance, student financial aid, human resources, graduation rates, and degree completions. The postsecondary sample surveys focus on individual student level surveys and include the following data collections: the National Postsecondary Student Aid Study (NPSAS), Beginning Postsecondary Student Longitudinal Study (BPS), Baccalaureate and Beyond Study (B&B) and the National Study of Postsecondary Faculty (NSOPF).

In addition to collecting postsecondary data, the PSD is also responsible for disseminating and reporting on the condition of education in the United States. Part of this responsibility includes providing education information and analyses to the U.S. Department of Education officials; Congress; and State and local education agency officials on a quick turnaround basis. In order to fulfill this responsibility, the Postsecondary Studies Division has established the National Education Data Resource Center (NEDRC). This contract will provide analytical and technical support for the NEDRC.

In addition to the NEDRC, the PSD, houses the National Postsecondary Education Cooperative (NPEC), whose mission is to "promote the quality, comparability and utility of postsecondary data and information that support policy development at the federal, state, and institution levels". NPEC fulfills this mission by establishing a research and development agenda to improve the quality of IPEDS data. This contract will provide support for the maintenance and updating of NPEC’s website.

The PSD also disseminates data through their website College Navigator. Using College Navigator students can search for information on postsecondary Title IV institutions. The information which students can access comes from IPEDS Surveys and OPE’s Campus Crime Survey, Equity in Athletics Disclosure Act (EADA) Survey, and the Accredited Schools Data Base. The Campus Crime Survey is mandated by the Jeanne Clery Disclosure of Campus Security Policy and Campus Crime Statistics Act, which requires all colleges and universities that participate in federal financial aid programs to keep and disclose information about crime on and near their respective campuses and provide this data to the Department. The EADA Survey is mandated by Section 1092, Subchapter IV, Chapter 28 of Title 20 of the United States Code, which requires co-educational institutions of postsecondary education that participate in a Title IV, federal student financial assistance program, and have an intercollegiate athletic program, to annually report to the Department of Education statistics on athletic participation, staffing, and revenues and expenses, for men's and women's athletic teams.

IPEDS Data is used to populate the sections of College Navigator that provide information on admissions, completions, enrollment, financial aid, and student retention and graduation rates. The Equity in Athletics Disclosure Act Survey populates the section of College Navigator which reports on what NCAA athletic teams each campus has and the number of men and women participating on each team, while the Campus Crime Survey provides statistics on the number of arrests and criminal offenses that have taken place on campus and in on-campus residence halls. Finally, the Accredited School Database provides information on College Navigator regarding what agencies provide accreditation to a postsecondary institution. In addition, information from the Accredited Schools database is used to create the collection universe for IPEDS and the sampling frame for the postsecondary sample surveys. This contract will provide support for OPE’s three data collections which are used by PSD to populate College Navigator, to develop the sampling frame for the PSD sample surveys and create the IPEDS Universe.

In fulfilling its mandate to “conduct and publish reports on specialized analyses of the meaning and significance of such statistics”, the PSD publishes statistical reports relevant to postsecondary education. This contract includes the development of a statistical report which will examine the average cost of completing a postsecondary award by field of study. It will utilize data from the IPEDS surveys including the IPEDS Finance Survey, Completions Survey, and Student Financial Aid Survey.

II. SCOPE OF WORK

The work to be performed under this contract shall support NCES’ mission to “collect and disseminate statistics and other data related to education in the United States and in other nations.” It will include analytical and statistical support for the NEDRC, maintenance and updating of NPEC’s website, the development of a statistical report using IPEDS data on the average cost per postsecondary completion by field of study, and data collection for the Campus Crime Survey, EADA Survey, and Accredited Schools List.

Task 1- Management

The contractor shall manage this contract in an efficient manner that fosters communications with staff, the COR, and potential users of the data.

Subtask 1.1 Post Award Kick-Off Meeting

Within the seven calendar days after contract award, the contractor’s project director and other key project staff as identified in the proposal shall meet with the Contracting Officer, the Contract Specialist, the COR, and other appropriate ED staff to review the overall contract tasks, to identify potential problems and possible solutions, and to discuss areas of concern related to the proposed project staffing plan and other management requirements. The primary purpose of this meeting is to refine the management, staffing, and scheduling plans. These refinements are not to alter the specifications of the contract, but to provide management information for use by both the contractor and the government in monitoring the work to be performed. This meeting is also to help the contractor to make use of the experience and materials that ED staff has gained over the years.

Subtask 1.2 Monthly Reports

The contractor shall submit monthly reports on the progress made in accomplishing each of the project tasks, the consumption of funds, problems encountered and solutions to the problems, and plans for the next month, including work performed by small businesses. As part of the monthly report, the contractor shall add the efforts made in complying with the small business subcontracting plan and the dollars as well as specific work that has been subcontracted to small businesses. The contractor shall include a section specifically titled Small Business Subcontracting Plan and indicate the name of the small business, contact information, type of small business, work that was subcontracted including what task the work falls under and the dollar amount subcontracted for that month. The monthly report shall be due on the 15th day of each month. The monthly report, invoice, and supporting documentation shall cover the previous month’s activities, for both the contractor and subcontractor(s). The contractor shall submit the monthly report via email to the CS, CO, and the COR.

The invoice (SF No. 1034) and documentation of expenses shall be submitted simultaneously with the monthly report.

TASK 2 -Support for the National Education Data Resource Center (NEDRC)

The contractor shall compile, maintain, analyze, publish, and disseminate the information and data that are gathered and maintained by the Postsecondary Studies Division (PSD) and this requires the establishment and/or maintenance of systems and procedures to aid in these activities. The contractor shall perform the following:

· Distribute data to NCES' constituents and respond to requests for information, relying first on published material, and second, on analysis, within 5 working days.

· Maintain all databases necessary to respond to requests in a secure contractor-supplied facility.

· Prepare programs necessary to merge new databases with the appropriate existing data in order to respond to data requests.

· In response to requests for information, create new datasets and extracts consisting of variables from the components of different PSD surveys.

· Format information as tables or graphic presentations according to NCES Style standards.

· Adhere to all NCES standards on data security and confidentiality requirements.

· Maintain telephone facilities and a toll free telephone number to receive requests from the Department's constituents. These facilities shall be staffed between 12:00 noon and 5:00 p.m. (Eastern Time) Monday through Friday.

· Provide voice mail for receiving requests outside of the normal business hours.

· Maintain an e-mail account to receive and to respond to requests from the public and from other government agencies.

· Maintain a FAX capability for the receipt of NEDRC requests.

· Maintain a tracking log that records all requests received, which includes the name of the requestor, affiliation, email address, mailing address, telephone number, fax number, description of work performed, and numbers of hours spent responding to request.

· Maintain a library of all custom reports, data files, or tables developed in response to a user requests. This information shall be archived onto a CD on a quarterly basis and this CD shall be sent to the COR.

· Respond to information requests from NCES for customized data tabulations within 5 business days from request.

· As requested, post data tables to the IPEDS table library on the IPEDS Website.

Deliverables:

The deliverables for the NEDRC are a monthly activity log, which shall be submitted via email to the COR by the 15th of each month, and a quarterly archive of all of the previous quarter’s customized reports, tables, and databases.

Task 3- Maintenance and Updating of the NPEC Website

The contractor shall provide maintenance and support for the National Postsecondary Education Cooperative (NPEC) http://nces.ed.gov/npec/. The contractor shall provide support to NPEC, as follows:

· Create, update, and maintain the content of the NPEC website according to NCES web standards

· Submit a monthly report that documents all changes to the NPEC Website

· Create an annual CD archive of NPEC website files for NCES

Task 4- IPEDS Analytic Report on Cost Per Completion

A very important product of PSD is analytical reports, which are produced using postsecondary data, such as the IPEDS data and data from the sample surveys, including BPS, B&B, NPSAS and NSOFAS. This task requires developing an analytic report using data from the IPEDS Completions Survey, the IPEDS Finance Component, and IPEDS Student Financial Aid Survey, to determine the average cost per completion by field of study. The contractor shall:

· Create each field of study using CIP codes.

· Submit a draft of the report that includes table shells and an outline of the report content for NCES approval.

· Upon receiving feedback from NCES on the report outline and table shells, prepare a first, full draft of the report, which contains graphs and exhibits that document the cost of completion by field of study and by institutional sector and level and includes narrative text that describes the findings of the analysis. The report shall include a technical appendix that documents the dataset(s) used to conduct the analysis and the statistical methods used in the analysis. The technical appendix shall include any statistical programming used to create the data set and to conduct statistical analysis.

· Prepare a final report that meets all NCES statistical and editorial standards. The contractor shall budget for up to three drafts of the full report in order to allow sufficient time for revisions based on NCES feedback.

· Produce the database used to conduct the analysis in a format that is compatible with the three major statistical packages used by NCES, i.e., STATA, SPSS and SAS.

· Prepare data documentation to accompany the database that includes the names and descriptions of all of the variables in the database and the statistical programming used to create the variables and conduct the statistical analyses that were included in the cost per completion report.

The deliverables and milestones for this task include:

Task 5- Web Data Collection Surveys (Campus Crime and EADA) and the Accredited Schools List (ASL) Software and Support – 2010

Note: The schedule for this task appears at the end of this section and will be finalized at the post award meeting.

Activity 1: Edit content for Campus Crime and EADA Collection

The contractor shall:

· Develop any new edits for all variables collected as determined by changes made to the existing system necessitated by new requirements specified by statute (HEOA or the Higher Education Opportunity Act) or OPE. These edits include range checks, computed comparisons, and comparisons with prior values, in addition to populating derived variables from the collected answers.

Activity 2: System Development, Testing and Documentation

· Develop, test and document all functions including new programming and testing, such as screen entry, warnings, edit failure, file import, and data locking.

· Design, test and document a website application that is capable of handling 1000 simultaneous users during peak usage times.

· Develop and deliver a systems architecture and delivery schedule prior to the development of any software. Software development shall proceed after OPE has approved this architecture and schedule.

· Document the system developed. Documentation shall include structure and content of all databases and program code completion with the calling relationship of code modules and function entry points. This documentation shall be delivered in an electronic format.

· All software developed shall comply with the accessibility standards published by the U.S. Access Board pursuant to section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act as amended by Congress in 1998. The Assistive Technology Team in the Office of the Chief Information Officer (OCIO) will evaluate the system for compliance.

Activity 3: Campus Crime Data Collection Application

· Maintain existing and develop new screen content (see http://surveys.ope.ed.gov/security/) and edits for the Campus Crime system in an architecture that is compatible with the overall Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS) data collection system.

· Test that the modified system functions in the same fashion as the IPEDS developed system and update the user guide for the data collection of the data application.

· Provide all programming code and documentation items developed to ED.

Activity 4: Equity in Athletics Data Collection Application

The contractor shall:

· Maintain existing and develop new screen content (see http://surveys.ope.ed.gov/athletics/) and edits for the Equity in Athletics (EADA) system in an architecture that is compatible with the overall IPEDS data collection system.

· Test that the modified system functions in the same fashion as the IPEDS developed system

· Prepare and update the user guide for the data collection of the data application.

· Provide all programming code and documentation items developed, upon request by the Department.

Activity 5: Data Conversion and Migration

· Complete the data collection process for all institutional data collected during the 2010 Campus Crime and EADA collection periods, by processing all the data collected and migrating the data to the appropriate public display websites (http://ope.ed.gov/security/) and (http://ope.ed.gov/athletics/Search.asp).

· Deliver a complete data set with documentation for each survey on separate CDs in SPSS, SQL and SAL formats.

Activity 6: Electronic Help Desk Call Records

· Maintain and enhance the electronic call record for both technical and policy related questions directed to the Help Desk related to Campus Crime, EADA and the Accredited Schools List. The electronic call record shall provide ED with information for data analysis purposes and help desk enhancements.

· Load the previous year’s call sheets, edit them and make the entire record available to the help desk and ED staff.

Activity 7: Campus Crime and EADA Data Download Analysis Tool

· Provide support for the existing web-based data download analysis tool (http://ope.ed.gov/athletics/) for the Campus Crime and EADA systems.

· Make any changes or additions as specified by ED or necessitated by the HEOA to the web-based analysis tool for use on the public web sites for both Campus Crime and EADA data.

· Ensure that the data archival procedure prevents data from being lost for both Campus Crime and EADA over multiple collection years and maintain a user’s guide related to these data download analysis tools.

Activity 8: ASL Maintain/Edit Database

· Maintain the ASL database by verifying existing data and resolving discrepancies to the greatest extent possible by a variety of methods. If data inconsistencies are identified that will require software revisions, the contractor shall discuss these revisions with ED and come to an agreement on how to proceed.

Activity 9: Maintain ASL Historical Database

· Add historical data to the accredited Schools list database as it becomes available.

Activity 10: Electronic Transmission of ASL Data

The contractor shall:

· Develop and test a mechanism and procedures for the electronic transmission of accreditation data from the accrediting agencies to ED.

· Develop a program that enables accrediting agencies to easily upload updates to the ASL databases for accrediting decisions and changes to select data (i.e., name changes, address changes, substantive changes, etc).

· Transfer the uploaded data to the Accredited Schools database. Note: The completion of this task is dependent upon ED satisfaction that an acceptable level of standardization can be reached by accrediting agencies with respect to the way they report similar data to ED (i.e., using like terminology for categories and processes).

Activity 11: Update ASL User Guide

· Update the user guide that contains instructions for providing information to update the Accredited Schools List for use by and distribution to accrediting agencies and ED staff. This user guide shall include instructions on items of information to provide , how to navigate the public site and an electronic data definition section.

Activity 12: Technical Help Desk Support

· Maintain a trained help desk staff to provide telephone and electronic correspondence support year round to institutions and agencies that require assistance in completing the Campus Crime and EADA surveys and accessing data related to the Accredited Schools List task.

Activity 13: Data Conversion and Migration for Campus Crime and EADA

· Process and migrate all the data collected to the appropriate Campus Crime and EADA websites (http://ope.ed.gov/security/) and (http://ope.ed.gov/athletics/Search.asp).

· Deliver the data on separate CDs in Excel, SQL and SPSS formats.

Activity 14: Update the Handbook and On-line Training for Campus Crime Reporting

· Update the Handbook for Campus Crime Reporting and the on-line Campus Crime Reporting Training located on the ED website http://www.ed.gov/admins/lead/safety/campus.html.

· Assist in convening workgroups to support development and or changes to the Handbook to further inform institutions on HEOA implementation issues identified during the ED negotiated rulemaking process.

Activity 15: Training for Campus Crime and Collection Memos

· Develop/update additional training materials and conduct up to two training sessions as requested by OPE to support the Handbook for Campus Crime Reporting and the on-line Campus Crime Training.

· Expedite the revisions to be made to regulations, training and materials both written and audio/visual that result from rule changes to the HEOA.

· Prepare and disseminate both pre and post-collection “reminder” data collection memos for both Campus Crime and EADA as well as up to two other “reminder” memos tied to activities institutions should be doing in preparation for upcoming data collection. The post-collection memo shall discuss the most common problems found during collection with suggestions for avoiding them in the future. The pre-collection memo shall contain key collection dates and reminders for preparing and assembling data required for submission in the collections.

Activity 16: Campus Crime and EADA Registration and Data Collection Letters

· Produce the Campus Crime and EADA Registration and Data Collection letters and mailing envelopes using the Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS) database to generate the institutional mailing addresses.

Deliverable

Due Date

Campus Crime Data Application

August 1, 2010

SCHEDULE

Schedule for Campus Crime

Schedule for Equity in Athletics Disclosure

III. Deliverable Specifications

The specifications for all deliverables to be generated by the tasks described in Section II are presented below. Unless otherwise specified, deliverables shall be submitted electronically to the COR.

A. Post Award Meeting Summary Notes

Within 7 days of the post award meeting, submit summary notes from the post award meeting. The summary notes shall document all that was discussed during the meeting and include a schedule for the OPE data collection activities.

B. Management Monthly Reports & Invoices

By the 15th of every month, submit a invoice and monthly report electronically that summarizes the major activities performed on each task, a summary of problems encountered, any remaining issues that need to be addressed and activities planned for the next month, including work performed by small businesses.

C. NEDRC Monthly Report

Prepare a log of the requests received in the previous monthly as an Excel spreadsheet that includes the following information:

Name of Requestor Organizational Affiliation of Requestor Telephone Number of Requestor Email Address of Requestor Data Request Work Performed to meet Request Approximate Time Spent on Request

D. NEDRC Quarterly Archives

At the end of each quarter, submit an archive of all responses to the data requests which required customized tabulations. The archive shall contain any customized data bases, tables, or statistical programming, which were required in order to respond to a data request.

E. NPEC Website CD

Annually, by March 15th, submit a CD archive that contains all the files from the NPEC website.

F. First Draft Cost Per Completions Report

Within 7 months of the contract award, submit a first draft of the IPEDS Completions Report that include all text, tables, appendixes, etc. It shall be in a format that meets NCES/IES standards for a technical report. NCES will have 1 month to review this report and provide detailed written comments to the contractor which they shall address in their second and final drafts of the report.

G. Final Draft of the Cost Per Completions Report

Within 18 months of contract award, submit the final draft of the Cost per Completion Report in a format that meets NCES/IES statistical and style standards for a technical report. The report shall incorporate all of feedback received from NCES from the first draft and second draft. The contractor shall prepare a document to accompany the final report that summarizes all of the feedback from NCES and how they responded to this feedback.

H. Cost Per Completion Data Set and Data Set Documentation

Within 18 months of contract award, submit the customized data set(s) used for the analysis in the Cost Per Completions Report. The data set(s) shall be in a format that is compatible with the major statistical packages used by NCES i.e.- SPSS, STATA and SAS. The data set documentation shall include a data dictionary which includes all the variables used in the data set and contains the following information: Name of the Variable, Variable Labels, Data Values, Value Labels. The data documentation shall also include all statistical programming that was used to create the variables and conduct statistical analyses.

I. System Design Documentation

For the EADA Data Collection, Campus Crime Data Collection and Accredited Schools List, provide a report that documents design documentation to include structure and content of all databases and program code completion with the calling relationship of code modules, function entry points, design specifications and a data dictionary.

J. Systems Architecture and Delivery Schedule

Develop a report that documents the systems architecture and delivery schedule for the Data Collection, Campus Crime Data Collection and Accredited Schools. Documentation shall include structure and content of all databases and program code completion with the calling relationship of code modules and function entry points. This documentation shall be delivered in an electronic format as a Word or Excel file.

K. Campus Crime Data Collection Application

Prepare a document that includes programming code and documentation items developed for the Campus Crime Data Collection Application.

L. EADA Data Collection Application

Prepare a document that includes programming code and documentation items developed for the Equity in Athletics Distribution Act EADA Data Collection Application.

M. Campus Crime and EADA Data File Delivery to ED

Migrate the Campus Crime and EADA data to the Department of Education websites (http://ope.ed.gov/security) and http://ope.ed.gov/athletics/ and submit the Campus Crime and EADA data files on separate CDs in Excel, SQL, and SPSS formats.

N. User Guide for Web Based Data Download Analysis Tool for Campus Crime and EADA.

Update the user guide for the online data analysis tool for both the Campus Crime and EADA data websites in Word format.

O. User Guide Materials for the Accredited Schools List for accrediting agencies and ED Staff

Provide user guide materials for the Accredited Schools List in Word format.

Summary and Timeline of Deliverables

IV. Inspection and Acceptance Procedures

The contractor shall consult with the COR before making any major decisions or developing the required deliverables. This process will include monthly phone calls to ED and biannual visits to ED to discuss potential project problems and progress. Preliminary drafts of all deliverables shall be provided at the earliest possible time to assure the final products will meet expectations with minimal revision. Each deliverable shall include two revisions based on feedback from NCES. All materials shall be approved before release. No deliverables or data shall be released to anyone without IES/NCES's review and COR approval.

For each of the deliverables, NCES will provide feedback on them or provide written notice within 14 days from receipt. The one exception to this will be the final draft of the cost per completion report which must undergo the NCES review which can take up to 6 months.

All work performed by the contractor shall conform to all NCES Statistical Standards, NCES IT Standards, and Style Standards. These standards can be found on the NCES website using the following links:

NCES Statistical Standards-http://nces.ed.gov/statprog

NCES Style Standards - http://nces.ed.gov/statprog/style.asp

NCES Web Standards- See Appendix A

V. Summary of Abbreviations

BPS- Beginning Postsecondary Students Survey B &B- Baccalaureate and Beyond Survey CIP- Classification of Instructional Programs COR- Contracting Officer Representative CO- Contracting Officer EADA- Equity in Athletics Disclosure Act ED- U.S. Department of Education HEOA- Higher Education Opportunity Act IPEDS- Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System IT- Internet Technology NCES- National Center for Education Statistics NEDRC- National Education Data Resource Center NPSAS- National Postsecondary Student Aid Survey NSOPF- National Survey of Postsecondary Faculty OCIO- Office of the Chief Information Officer OPE- Office of Postsecondary Education PSD- Postsecondary Studies Division The Department- U.S. Department of Education

VI. Security Clause

Security Clause

The contractor shall comply with the Department's IT security policy requirements as set forth in the Handbook for Information Assurance Security Policy and related procedures and guidance. The contractor shall comply with IT security requirements in the Federal Information Security Management Act (FISMA), Office of Management and Budget (OMB) Circulars, and the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) standards and guidance.

These requirements include the successful certification and accreditation of the system before it can be implemented. To ensure the system can be certified and accredited, security controls shall be designed and implemented in the system consistent with the NIST 800-53 - Recommended Security Controls for Federal Information Systems identified for the impact level of the system. The impact level will be determined via the completion of the Department's inventory form and critical infrastructure protection survey.

System security documentation shall be developed to document the implementation of the security controls for the system and the contractor shall be available for interviews and demonstrations of security control compliance to support the certification and accreditation process.

In addition, if the system is rated as a moderate or high impact system, vulnerability scanning and penetration testing shall be performed on the hosting facility and application by the Department's Certification Review Group as part of the certification and accreditation process. Appropriate access agreements will be reviewed and signed before any scanning or testing occurs."

Appendix A- IES/NCES Web Standards

All website developers should be familiar with these general standards before beginning any work on IES / NCES websites. Additional standards in Section 3 apply to the many pages on the IES / NCES websites that are served by data-driven, dynamic web applications (written in classic ASP or ASP.NET 2.0/3.5).

1.1 - File and Directory Standards Last revised: 04/20/2009 | Notes Added source / sourcecode directory.

1.1.1 - Directory Structure Layout In the interests of reducing maintenance and bringing about directory standardization to the IES / NCES website, individual program areas are directed to break down their web sections into a more manageable directory structure. At a minimum, separate folders must be provided for images, PDF files, data and include files. Any additional files requiring special access or handling should also be placed in their own subdirectory structure. Do not put any of these components inside the root and do not mix files within a subdirectory (e.g. PDFs with .asp pages). Additionally, the name NET should never be used as a folder name. It is used for other purposes in our environment and as such is a prohibited folder name. If your site does not follow this structure it will not be moved over to the production area. All DLLs need to be registered in the components directory through the Members site. The default naming convention is as follows:

1. images - all GIF, JPG, PNG and SVG images.

2. PDF - all PDF files

3. inc - all classic ASP server side includes (note that include files must follow naming conventions).

4. css - Cascading Style Sheet (*.css) files.

5. js - JavaScript / JScript (*.js) files.

6. data - all downloadable components. These should be further broken out by: xls for Excel, ppt for PowerPoint, and zip for zip files. Word and text files are not acceptable formats for the website with the exception of text files for record layout documentation.

7. dev - old or unused files (these will never appear on the IES / NCES production website)

8. source or sourcecode - used for source code repositories when deployments involve precompiled code The directory structure listed above may be repeated as needed in any subdirectories or other applications. For applications sharing a common set of files (e.g. CSS files, icons, etc.), a higher-level directory may be referenced (e.g. nces.ed.gov/css/ or /common/images/).

Any files or directories that are not referenced by our website should be deleted or placed in the dev directory. If you choose to use Interdev or FrontPage to create web pages, you will notice creation of several three letter directories preceded by an underscore such as _vti and _ctf. In addition to these, files such as vssver.scc, and _notes which are created by applications but not needed to run web pages will not be moved over to the IES / NCES production web server and must be deleted from the development server before a request will be actioned.

Files and folders with the following extensions must never be used in production in any circumstances:

· dev or any variation of development

· old

· bak, or any variation of backup

· test

· copy

· notes

· ftp If any of these are used they must remain in development. Requests that include such files intermingled with legitimate files will be rejected.

Only necessary files should exist in your website's directories. Do NOT leave extraneous files or directories in your website. This includes temporary files and source control marker files.

Top of Page | Contents | 1.1 File and Directory Standards | View this Standard Only Last revised: 08/03/2009

1.1.2 - File Naming Conventions Keep all filenames in lower case. Make your filenames intuitive to the people who will be seeing them ("orgchart2000" rather than "oc2k") - this will help make your information easy to search for and find. Try to be descriptive in your file name, but not verbose. One word names are always best, but useless when cryptic.

· Most special characters are not supported in file names for the web on our servers. Web names (URLs) should be alphanumeric (letters and numbers). Examples of Special Characters not supported (this is not a complete list) include: (*) asterisks, (?) question marks, (!) exclamation point, and (@) at signs.

· More than one dot or period (.) in a filename is prohibited. This character should be reserved for offsetting the file extension (filename.asp).

· Spaces in filenames are prohibited. If you need to separate words in a file name, use underscore ( _ ) or dash ( - ) characters.

· As a rule use only letters, numbers and underscores. Anything else appearing in a request could be returned for renaming.

· DO NOT change file or directory names arbitrarily. Once a file is named it should retain that name when possible. This will result in broken links, as other parts of the site may be pointing to existing files.

Top of Page | Contents | 1.1 File and Directory Standards | View this Standard Only Last revised before April 2009

1.1.3 - Website Default Document A default document is the web page that is displayed when a browser request (URL) does not include a specific file name. The IES / NCES web servers search directories for the default document name Default.aspx for ASP.NET 2.0+ applications, and index.asp for all other applications. All IES / NCES websites must follow this convention. (e.g. http://ies.ed.gov displays http://ies.ed.gov/index.asp) Top of Page | Contents | 1.1 File and Directory Standards | View this Standard Only Last revised before April 2009

1.1.4 - Temporary Files Many applications are developed for the NCES website that make use of the creation of temporary files. These files might include data tables or graphs. Regardless of the content for these temporary files they must all be stored in one central location in the IES/NCES web environment. A folder has been designated called tempfiles in which all temporary files must be stored. The path for these temporary files is off the root of the NCES website located at: /tempfiles/foldernameforyourapplication. You cannot place these tempfiles within the web share of a specific application. The tempfiles folder is automatically emptied out twice a day at 7:00 am and 7:00 pm. For help in setting this up please contact IES Web / Network Support.

Top of Page | Contents | 1.1 File and Directory Standards | View this Standard Only Last revised before April 2009

1.1.5 - File Attributes IES Support will control and maintain file-level attributes for applications. Therefore, when modifying or uploading files, they MUST NOT be set to Read-only or Hidden. Also, do not enable any other of Windows' Advanced Attributes (Archive and Index / Compress or Encrypt attributes) for files. Beware of files copied from source control programs (e.g. Microsoft Visual Source Safe) as these may be set to Read-only when retrieved from source control databases.

Top of Page | Contents | 1.1 File and Directory Standards | View this Standard Only Last revised before April 2009

1.1.6 - Supported File Types Standard web content (HTML files, plain text files, JavaScript (.js), Cascading Style Sheets (.css) and images (JPG, GIF, PNG and SVG) are supported as well as PDF files. These other file types are also served and supported by the IES / NCES websites:

· Active Server Pages (.asp) - All ASP versions that are supported by Windows 2000 or Windows 2003 are allowed.

· ASP.NET (.aspx) - Standard ASP.NET 2.0 or 3.5 content is supported, including user controls, MasterPages and HTTP handlers (.ashx), as well as XML Web Services when they are not used for public serving of data (most approved web services are internal only). (.NET) Remoting is NOT currently used (but may be in future).

· Macromedia Flash (.swf) - Macromedia Flash is a standard for multimedia playback featuring vector-based images, keyframe animation, MP3-compressed audio, and a host of interactivity elements. The Flash client-side plug-in can perform streaming animation and audio playback. Flash media files are usually assigned the extension SWF and are stored on the server-side (similar to an embedded graphic). Flash can be used on the IES/NCES website after first securing approval from the NCES webmaster for any planned application. However, a non-flash alternative must accompany any flash application.

Note: When using Flash, the <object> must have a wmode parameter set to opaque and must also be embedded with the opaque parameter. i.e.

<param name="wmode" value="opaque" /> <embed wmode="opaque" src="movie/movie.swf" quality="high" pluginspage="http://www.macromedia.com/go/getflashplayer" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="0" height="0"></embed> This is to prevent Flash objects overlaying over the top of any HTML content (such as the drop down navigation hover menus in the HFS).

· Microsoft Office (.xls, .doc, etc.) - Microsoft Office files are allowed.

· Binaries (.dll, .exe, .ocx) - With the exception of standard ASP.NET 2.0/3.5 DLLs, the NCES webmaster must approve all binaries deployed within a program area. Furthermore, these extensions must be separated into a Script subdirectory within a site, or, at the webmaster's discretion, moved to the global Script subdirectory. Full documentation (as well as source code) must be provided with the extension describing, at a minimum, what the extension does, why it is needed, and any necessary security precautions. Any custom ActiveX COM/DLL objects require testing on our development server before they can be registered on our web servers.

· XML and XSLT (.xsl) - small amounts of non-sensitive data may be stored as XML on the web server. XML Transformations performed using XSLT are permitted.

The following file types are NOT supported and may not be used:

· FrontPage and Interdev Extensions - These are not loaded on the production server and their use is prohibited. Configuration subdirectories (e.g. vti_cnf) will not be deployed into production websites.

· ColdFusion, Perl, Python, PHP, CGI - None of these technologies are supported on IES websites.

· Java Applets - For performance, accessibility and security reasons, Java Applets (or any applications requiring the user to have Java Virtual Machine installed) are not permitted on the website. (JavaScript is allowed.)

· VB Script Files (.vbs) - All VBScript must be incorporated into ASP pages (.asp).

· ASP.NET 1.x - The only versions of the .NET Framework supported are 2.0 or 3.5. No other versions will be installed on IES servers.

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1.2 - HTML Composition Last revised: 08/6/2009 | Notes Firefox 2 not longer supported. Statistics updated from WebTrends.

1.2.1 - Cross Browser Compatibility All IES hosted web pages must be accessible, at a minimum, by the following web browsers:

1. Internet Explorer version 6.0 and higher (Internet Explorer version 8 soon to be supported)

2. Firefox 3.* (Firefox 2 no longer supported) According to WebTrends, for the month of July 2009 the top browsers for visits to nces.ed.gov were:

1. Internet Explorer 7 - 38%

2. Firefox 3 - 22%

3. Internet Explorer 6 - 13%

4. Internet Explorer 8 - 11%

5. Firefox 2 - 0.5%

6. Safari - 0.3% More recent statistics on browser usage are available at https://webtrends.nces.ed.gov for approved members, or see an overall trended history of the Usage share of web browsers.

To help achieve this:

· All website content should be XHTML 1.0 and use up-to-date widely supported standards, such as validated CSS - avoid using deprecated tags (e.g. <font> <center> <u> <strike>), keep all tags and attributes in lowercase, enclose all attributes in double quotes (e.g. nowrap="nowrap") and close all tags (e.g. <br/>).

· To convey emphasis in content, either use the <strong> and <em> tags or use a style (via a <span> tag, for example), instead of <b> and <i> tags. <b> and <i> tags convey only a visual style onscreen and while they may be useful for purely visual elements in certain applications, for general content on the IES / NCES website they should not be used.

· Check client-side (JavaScript) functionality - never use browser specific JavaScript. For example, use document.getElementById instead of document.all, which is only supported by IE; never use the const keyword, which is Mozilla-specific.

· Use existing stylesheets that have been tested for cross browser compatibility.

· Use HTML tables for content requiring tabular layouts, and <div> tags with CSS for other layout only where practical. In many cases, <div> tags may not be practical for layout, especially for cross browser compatibility. Also, to comply with Section 508 requirements, pages should be readable without stylesheets. Using complex <div> layouts may make pages unreadable without stylesheets.

Make use of the W3C Markup Validation Service to validate your HTML, CSS and check for broken links.

Top of Page | Contents | 1.2 HTML Composition | View this Standard Only Last revised: 04/20/2009 | Notes Statistics updated.

1.2.2 - Screen Resolutions The IES website is designed for a minimum screen resolution of 800 by 600 pixels, which is large enough to cover the vast majority of users.

Screen resolution statistics for users of the NCES home page as of April 2009 are:

1. 1024 x 768 38.4%

2. 1280 x 800 18.23%

3. 1280 x 1024 17.04%

4. 1440 x 900 6.52%

5. 800 x 600 5.05%

6. 1680 x 1050 4.25%

7. 1152 x 864 3.07% Horizontal scrolling should not be necessary to view pages at this resolution. Table should not have absolute widths. By default, page widths are set by IES global style sheets. (They do not exceed 750 pixels.) This will ensure no horizontal scrolling occurs.

It is not a good idea to have several pages of text on a single web page that forces the user to scroll and scroll and scroll some more. However, if you find that you do have several pages of text then they should be organized in a logical manner with a contents area that provides headings, links to text (or graphics or data) and a "Top" button following each section. This will permit the user to go directly to their area of interest and then return to the table of contents to continue with their selection. An example of this can be found at: http://nces.ed.gov/surveys/ruraled/Definitions.asp.

Top of Page | Contents | 1.2 HTML Composition | View this Standard Only Last revised before April 2009

1.2.3 - HTML Editors While IES does not prohibit using any particular HTML editor for creating web pages, it is important to note that no custom FrontPage, Interdev, DreamWeaver, etc. objects nor extensions (such as Search, ImageMap, etc.) will be supported on our site. In addition, you may find that these tools generate extraneous folders such as vti_*. If you are using one of these editors you must remove such folders from the IES development server. See Supported File Types for a list of allowed files. Some programs used to create or edit HTML (e.g. Microsoft Word, some WYSIWYG editors) will also generate a lot of extraneous code. Beware of these.

An HTML editor that we have found to produce "clean" code is Macromedia HomeSite. You may also use any text-based editor that generates "clean" code.

Note: For ASP.NET 2.0+ web applications, Microsoft Visual Studio 2005 or later is recommended.

Top of Page | Contents | 1.2 HTML Composition | View this Standard Only Last revised before April 2009

1.2.4 - DOCTYPE and Encoding Declarations The first line of every HTML document must be a DOCTYPE declaration (document type declaration). This informs the validator which version of HTML you're using. DOCTYPEs are a key component of compliant web pages: your markup and CSS won't validate without them. The opening html tag should also have the correct XML namespace URL. For example, for a typical XHTML 1.0 Transitional document:

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd"> <html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"> IES webpages should use XHTML 1.0 Transitional as a baseline default, although pages may also be written in XHTML 1.0 Strict.