REQUEST FOR APPLICATION # 6100066135

Central Repository for Academic Records

TECHNICAL SUBMITTAL

The State Board of Private Licensed Schools (the PLS Board) and the State Board of Higher Education (SBHE) seeks to contract with a vendor to serve as the central repository for student transcripts. The PLS Board and the SBHE hereafter collectively referred to as the Boards. The Division of Postsecondary Proprietary Training, and the Division of Higher Education, Access, and Equity, within the Pennsylvania Department of Education (Department), will serve as the points of contact for this contract.

Private Licensed Schools, schools licensed/registered by the PLS Board, are mandated to store records for a period of 50 years. The vendor will serve as the central repository for Private Licensed Schools to store and service the records for students of such schools.

The central repository will accept, safeguard, and service transcripts for students attending Private Licensed Schools for the past 50 years, including the transcripts of schools that have closed during this time. The current central repository holds approximately 940,000 transcripts belonging to students at closed private licensed schools for the past 50 years and transcripts belonging to students who have attended open private licensed schools in the past 5 years. There are currently 186 open private licensed schools. The number of open private licensed schools may vary over the term of the contract. Open private licensed schools who have been operating for longer than 5 years will be submitting historical records over the next year, with an anticipated addition of 300,000 transcripts. The repository will store the then-current student records for the 186 open Private Licensed Schools. It is estimated that open private licensed schools will upload an additional 65,000 transcripts per year.

Open private licensed schools have begun to upload transcripts of current students to the central repository as of September 2025. Open private licensed schools are required to only store transcripts with the central repository but have the option to have the central repository also service the transcripts for the school. All closed school transcripts are to be stored and serviced by the central repository.

Institutions of higher education, through the SBHE, may also elect to use the services of the central repository to store and service student transcripts at any time. Institutions of higher education would include: community colleges; Universities in the State System of Higher Education; Lincoln University; Penn State University; Temple University; University of Pittsburgh; Thaddeus Stevens College of Technology; Rural Regional College of Northern Pennsylvania; all independent colleges, universities and seminaries located in Pennsylvania; and out-of-state institutions of higher education authorized by the Pennsylvania Department of Education to operate as an Education Enterprise in Pennsylvania. Institutions of higher education which close and fail to place student records in a readily available depository will be directed by SBHE to submit student records to the central repository. It is unknown when and if any institutions of higher education may close, whether any institution may elect to use the services of the central repository, and the volume of records that would be required to be stored and serviced for any such institutions of higher education.

The central repository is responsible for ingesting paper records and PDF documents. Paper transcripts may require extra care if the paper stock has aged or has otherwise been damaged.

PDF documents may contain numerous student records. In both instances there may be unnecessary documents that may need to be purged. There is no required template format for transcripts so each school may have its own unique template. Each school may also present transcripts under former or alternative names, as well as in different formats. Historical transcripts may also lack common unique student identifiers, such as student identification number or date of birth. Transcripts may also have faded graphics or text that is otherwise difficult to read. Transcripts may also be handwritten.

The central repository is responsible for tracking the ingestion of transcripts by school, by student, and by academic year. This is to enable Department staff to track the historical and on-going required school submissions.

The central repository is responsible for establishing the required protocol for schools to upload transcripts. The repository shall clearly communicate the upload requirements and provide necessary technical support directly to schools.

The central repository is responsible for providing a process for students to be able to request their transcripts. The repository is also responsible for providing a process to facilitate third-party transcript requests and education verifications. The process must provide for the student’s identity verification and authorization and a secure and timely delivery method.

The central repository is responsible for establishing a broadly accepted method for payment of the fee for obtaining a copy of a student’s transcript. The central repository will establish the fees of identity verification, transcript request, third-party request, and education verifications.

However, at no time should the fees exceed the average fees reasonably charged by similar transcript service providers. Any changes in the fees being charged are to be reported to the Department with 60 days’ prior written notice.

The central repository will operate at no cost to the Commonwealth, the Department, or the Boards. Rather, the central repository will earn revenue from the fees for providing services to the schools, students and third parties. The proposal should include a five-year budget plan that demonstrates how the central repository will recover the costs of this work and the itemized fees to be charged to students, schools, and third parties. The plan should further identify the costs expected to be incurred for collecting records, ingesting records, implementing processes and protocols, software coding and development, storage and security, and servicing of the records for the length of the contract. The Selected vendor will be held to the prices it submits through the RFP process for the first two years of the fully executed contract. Thereafter, the vendor may implement a change in its fees with 60 days’ prior written notice to the Department, such fees not to exceed the average fees reasonably charged by similar transcript service providers as determined by the Department in its sole discretion.

The central repository must provide to the Department itemized financial and service reporting every six months that demonstrates: 1) a breakdown of costs incurred; 2) income related to services provided under the contract; 3) number of requests by name of school broken down by the number of requests that were successfully serviced and the number of requests that were not able to be successfully serviced; 4) a breakdown by name of the schools ingested and the total number of records for each by academic year; and 5) the fees associated with each school broken down by the type of fees.

The central repository must refer students and third parties to the Department when a student or third party requests a record and it is not found.

The central repository must provide a secure storage system with an appropriate backup method to safeguard student records in full compliance with the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) and all applicable federal and state laws and regulations regarding privacy, records and data breach protection. The central repository must develop and maintain a plan to safeguard the storage of the records in its custody in the case of a catastrophic event, bankruptcy, or dissolution. This plan is to be shared with the Department. If the current plan changes, the Department is to be provided with a copy of the revised plan at least 60 days in advance.

The central repository must maintain adequate security to protect student data and prevent unauthorized access or data breaches. The central repository will monitor, prevent and deter unauthorized system access. The central repository shall comply with state and federal data breach notification laws and regulations and shall promptly report security incidents to the Department. The Offeror’s response must include a third-party review of the Offeror’s existing security protocols. All contract-related data and information is to be maintained and stored in the United States.

The central repository must provide responsive technical support for: schools seeking to upload transcripts; Department staff seeking to confirm information; and students and third-party services requesting transcripts. Tech support will be sufficiently staffed and trained to provide timely support within 1-2 business days.

The central repository must provide a means for Department staff to search and review student-level transcripts and related information. Additionally, Department staff must be able to review the number of records uploaded for each school by academic year. Department staff must be able to view school contact and user information and school account activity.

The contract with the central repository shall be valid for five years. The central repository must develop and maintain a plan for transition to another vendor in the case of termination or non-renewal of the contract. This plan is to be approved by the Department. If the plan changes, the Department must be provided with a copy of the revised plan at least 60-days in advance for approval.

I-1. Statement of the Project. State in succinct terms your understanding of the project presented, or the service required by this RFA.

Offeror Response

I-2. Qualifications.

A. Company Overview. A minimum of two years of experience serving as a transcript storage and service provider with demonstrated positive customer service experiences.

B. Prior Experience. Demonstrated experience protecting, storing, and servicing of over one million transcripts. Demonstrate not only the company’s achievements, but also the work done by the individuals assigned to this project. Information should demonstrate the actual customer, including their name, address, and contact information.

C. Personnel. Describe in narrative form the number of executive and professional personnel who will be engaged in the work and indicate where these personnel will be physically located during the time they are engaged in the Project. For key personnel, including the project leadership team and those assigned to this project, provide the employee’s name, and through a resume or similar document, the employee’s education and experience in safeguarding, storing, and servicing student transcripts. Additionally, indicate the responsibilities each employee will have on the project, their working position title, and how long they have been with your company.

D. Subcontractors: Provide a subcontracting plan for all subcontractors, including small diverse business and small business subcontractors, who will be assigned to the Project. The selected Offeror is prohibited from subcontracting or outsourcing any part of this Project without the express written approval from the Commonwealth. Upon awarding the contract resulting from this RFA, subcontractors included in the proposal submission are deemed approved. For each position included in your subcontracting plan provide:

1. Name of subcontractor;

2. Primary contact name and email;

3. Address of subcontractor;

4. Description of services to be performed;

5. Number of employees by job category assigned to this project; and

6. Resumes (if appropriate and available).

E. Budget: The central repository will operate at no cost to the Commonwealth, the

Department, or the Boards. Rather, the central repository will earn revenue from the fees charged to the schools, students and third parties. The proposal should include a five-year budget plan that demonstrates how the central repository will recover the costs of this work and the itemized fees to be charged to students, schools, and third parties. However, at no time should the fees exceed the average fees reasonably charged by similar transcript service providers. The Selected vendor will be held to the prices it submits through the RFP process for the first two years of the fully executed contract. Thereafter, the vendor may implement a change in its fees with 60 days’ prior written notice to the Department, such fees not to exceed the average fees reasonably charged by similar transcript service providers as determined by the Department in its sole discretion. The plan should further identify the costs expected to be incurred for collecting records, ingesting records, implementing processes and protocols, software coding and development, storage and security, and servicing of the records for the length of the contract.

5-Year Budget Plan Year 1 Year 2 Year 3 Year 4 Year 5

Revenue Item(s) Revenue Item(s) Revenue Item(s) Total Revenue Expense Item(s) Expense Item(s) Expense Item(s) Total Expenses

The central repository must provide itemized financial and service reporting every six months that demonstrates: 1) a breakdown of costs incurred; 2) income related to services provided under the contract; 3) number of requests by name of school broken down by the number of requests that were successfully serviced and the number of requests that were not able to be successfully serviced; 4) a breakdown by name of the schools ingested and the total number of records for each by academic year; and 5) the request fees associated with each school broken down by the type of fees.

6-Month Financial and Service Reporting Revenue Item(s)

Total Revenue Expense Item(s) Expense Item(s) Expense Item(s) Total Expenses Number of Requests Number of Successful Requests Newly ingested school + number of records Total number of transcripts ingested/available

I-3. Training. If appropriate, indicate recommended training for Department staff and school personnel. Include recommendations for training by assigned responsibility, the number to be trained, duration of the training, place of the training, curricula, training materials to be used, number and frequency of sessions, and number and level of instructors recommended.

I-4. Financial Capability. Describe your company’s financial stability and economic capability to fulfill the contract requirements. Include the company’s 2023, 2024 and 2025 (if available) audited financial statements, along with a year-to-date income statement, balance sheet, and cash flow statement. Disclose whether the company or the principals have filed for personal bankruptcy or served as an officer in a company or business that has filed for bankruptcy. Disclose whether any of the principal officers or the project manager have been employed by Pennsylvania institution of higher education that has closed. The Commonwealth reserves the right to request additional information to evaluate an Offeror’s financial capability.

I-5. Tasks. Describe in narrative form your technical plan for accomplishing the work using the task descriptions set forth below as your reference point. Modifications of the task descriptions are permitted; however, reasons for changes should be fully explained.

Indicate the number of personnel hours allocated to each task. Include a Program Evaluation and Review Technique (PERT) or similar type display, time related, showing each event. If more than one approach is apparent, comment on why you chose this approach.

1. The central repository will receive and ingest electronic records, paper records and PDF documents from open and closed Private Licensed Schools and institutions of higher education. The processes for ingestion must allow for potential poor quality or extraneous documents to be included. The process for ingestion must allow for varied transcript formatting.

2. Ingestion, Storage, and Service

a. Store and service over 940,000 existing closed Private Licensed Schools transcripts.

b. Receive and ingest all historical transcripts for open Private Licensed Schools.

c. Receive and ingest transcripts for open Private Licensed Schools each year for then current students.

d. Store historical and future transcripts for open Private Licensed Schools.

e. Service open Private Licensed Schools transcripts upon school request.

f. Receive, ingest, store, and service transcripts of closed institutions of higher education, upon request from such institutions.

3. The central repository will track all transcripts received by awarding school name and location, as well as academic year.

4. The central repository is responsible for the process in which schools upload PDF documents directly to the repository for ingestion. The central repository is responsible for establishing the required protocol for schools to upload transcripts. The repository shall clearly communicate the upload requirements and provide necessary technical support directly to schools.

5. The central repository will implement a process in which schools may upload a more current transcript and have the old transcript overwritten.

6. The central repository will receive annual transcript uploads from open Private Licensed Schools, generally between July 1 and September 30.

7. The central repository is responsible for the process and system development necessary in which students and third parties may request transcripts.

a. The process must provide for the student’s identity verification and authorization.

b. The process must provide for secure delivery of the transcript.

c. Broadly accepted methods of payment must be offered.

d. The Selected vendor will be held to the prices they submit through the RFP process for the first two years of the fully executed contract. Thereafter, the vendor may implement a change in its fees with 60 days’ prior written notice to the Department, such fees not to exceed the average fees reasonably charged by similar transcript service providers. The repository will provide transcripts within 5 business days of the date of transcript request and payment of fees.

e. The repository will refer all unsuccessful searches to the Department for further assistance.

8. The central repository will safeguard, store, and service transcripts for 50 years following the date of the student’s graduation or withdrawal or until the records are transferred to a successor repository.

9. The central repository will implement a secure procedure for destroying transcripts after 50 years following the date of graduation or withdrawal.

10. The central repository will provide a secure storage system with an appropriate backup method to safeguard student records in full compliance with the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) and all applicable federal and state laws and regulations regarding privacy, records and data breach protection. All contract-related data and information is to be maintained and stored in the United States.

11. The central repository will provide a plan to safeguard the storage of the records in its custody in the case of a catastrophic event, bankruptcy, or dissolution. This plan is to be shared with the Department. If the current plan changes, the Department is to be provided with a copy of the revised plan at least 60 days in advance.

12. The central repository will maintain adequate security to protect student data and prevent unauthorized access or data breaches. The central repository will monitor, prevent and deter unauthorized system access. All known data breach attempts must be reported to the Department within two (2) business days. The repository shall comply with state and federal data breach notification laws and regulations and shall promptly report security incidents to the Department.

13. The central repository will provide responsive technical support for schools seeking to upload transcripts, Department staff seeking to confirm information, and students and third-party services requesting transcripts. Tech support will be sufficiently staffed and trained to provide support within two (2) business days.

14. The central repository will provide a means for Department staff to search for and review student-level transcripts and related information. Additionally, Department staff must be able to review the number of records uploaded for each school, by academic year.

Department staff must be able to view school contact and user information, as well as school account activity.

15. The repository will provide a minimum of two years’ notice prior to discontinuing this service.

16. The repository will maintain a service website for receiving and sending transcripts that is ADA compliant.

17. Transition:

a. The selected Offeror shall assume full responsibility of the work from the incumbent repository within sixty (60) days of the effective date of the contract. The selected Offeror shall submit a draft Transition Plan with its proposal which includes all activities necessary to transition services from the incumbent repository to the selected Offeror without disruption of services.

The selected Offeror shall meet with the PDE to review the draft Transition Plan and gather any additional details required to finalize the plan. A finalized Transition Plan shall be submitted to PDE within ten (10) calendar days of receiving the notice to proceed. PDE requires ten (10) business days to review the proposed plan and comment. A final plan, revised based on PDE feedback, shall be delivered to PDE within five (5) business days of receiving PDE feedback. The plan shall be updated throughout implementation as requested by PDE.

b. At the end of the transition task, the selected Offeror shall prepare a final Transition Report that documents the completion of the transition activities and provides the status of each high-level task and activity that took place during the transition period.

The final Transition Report shall validate the selected Offeror has transitioned all services.

I-6. Reports and Project Control.

A. Status Report. The central repository will provide a written status report which itemizes financial and service reporting every six (6) months to demonstrate: 1) a breakdown of costs incurred; 2) income related to services provided under the contract;

3) number of requests by name of school broken down by the number of requests that were successfully serviced and the number of requests that were not able to be successfully serviced; 4) a breakdown by name of the schools ingested and the total number of records for each by academic year; and 5) the fees associated with each school broken down by the type of fees.

Offeror Response

B. Problem Identification Report. An “as required” report identifying problem areas. The report should describe the problem and its impact on the project overall and on each affected task. It should list possible courses of action with advantages and disadvantages of each and include Offeror recommendations with supporting rationale.

Offeror Response

C. Final Report. In lieu of a final report itemized financial and service reporting will be provided every six (6) months.

I-7. Requirements. The central repository will receive, ingest, safeguard, and service transcripts for all Private Licensed Schools and service-contracted operating Private Licensed Schools and for closed institutions of higher education which elect to utilize the services under the contract.

The central repository currently stores approximately 940,000 records, with additional historical records forthcoming, as well as current and future transcripts to be uploaded. It is estimated an additional 300,000 transcripts will be uploaded by 12/31/2027. The repository will serve over 180 open Private Licensed Schools who served 126,900 students in the 23-24 SY.

The central repository must be able to receive and ingest both paper and PDF documents.

Transcript ingestion is to be tracked by school, student, and academic year. Student data will be protected from unauthorized access, data breaches, catastrophic events, bankruptcy, or dissolution. Technical support will be provided to schools and Department staff. Department staff shall have access to school-level and student-level data.

The central repository will provide a means for students and third parties to request transcripts. Transcripts will be transmitted securely to requestors. Student identity and authorization will be confirmed prior to the release of transcripts. Technical support will be provided to students and third-party requestors.

A. Emergency Preparedness. To support continuity of operations during an emergency, including a pandemic, the Commonwealth needs a strategy for maintaining operations for an extended period of time. One part of this strategy is to ensure that essential contracts that provide critical business services to the Commonwealth have planned for such an emergency and put contingencies in place to provide the contracted goods and services.

1. Describe how you anticipate such a crisis will impact your operations.

2. Describe your emergency response continuity of operations plan. Please attach a copy of your plan, or at a minimum, summarize how your plan addresses the following aspects of pandemic preparedness:

a. Employee training (describe your organization’s training plan, and how frequently your plan will be shared with employees);

b. Identified essential business functions and key employees (within your organization) necessary to carry them out;

c. Contingency plans for:

i. How your organization will handle staffing issues when a portion of key employees are incapacitated due to illness;

and.

ii. How employees in your organization will carry out the essential functions if contagion control measures prevent them from coming to the primary workplace.

d. How your organization will communicate with staff and suppliers when primary communications systems are overloaded or otherwise fail, including key contacts, chain of communications (including suppliers), etc. and;

e. How and when your emergency plan will be tested, and if the plan will be tested by a third party.

I-8. Objections and Additions to IT Contract Terms and Conditions. The Offeror will identify which, if any, of the terms and conditions it would like to negotiate and what additional terms and conditions the Offeror would like to add to the standard contract terms and conditions.

The Offeror’s failure to make a submission under this paragraph will result in its waiving its right to do so later, but the Issuing Office may consider late objections and requests for additions if to do so, in the Issuing Office’s sole discretion, would be in the best interest of the Commonwealth. The Issuing Office may, in its sole discretion, accept or reject any requested changes to the standard contract terms and conditions. The Offeror shall not request changes to the other provisions of the RFA, nor shall the Offeror request to completely substitute its own terms and conditions for this RFA. All terms and conditions must appear in one integrated contract. The Issuing Office will not accept references to the Offeror’s, or any other, online guides or online terms and conditions contained in any proposal.

Regardless of any objections set out in its proposal, the Offeror must submit its proposal, including the cost proposal, based on the terms and conditions set out in the IT Contract Terms and Conditions. The Issuing Office will reject any proposal that is conditioned on the negotiation of the terms and conditions set out in the IT Contract Terms and Conditions or to other provisions of the RFA.

The requirement for the ingestion, safeguarding, and servicing of academic transcripts for a minimum of 50 years following graduation or withdrawal is a non-negotiable requirement in this RFP because this is a mandate of the Private Licensed Schools Act.

I-9. Questions and Answers: The Commonwealth requests that questions be submitted by email no later than September 24, 2026, 3:00 PM Eastern Standard Time so that staff can adequately address all questions. Questions may be sent to our Procurement Office at:

fjumper@pa.gov. Please include the following in the subject line: “RFA # - Central Repository for PLS Academic Records”

A listing of the written questions submitted, and the Commonwealth's responses will be made available on the eMarketplace solicitation #6100066135. An addendum to the RFA will be posted at eMarketplace (http://www.emarketplace.state.pa.us).

I-10. Due Date: RFA responses must be received by October 12, 2026, at 3:00 PM Eastern Standard Time. To be considered for this solicitation, the vendor must submit an electronic copy mailto:jamdomen@pa.gov email to the PDE's Procurement Office. Email submissions should be sent to: Falina Jumper, Procurement Specialist, who will serve as Point of Contact on this RFA at: fjumper@pa.gov.

Once the Commonwealth has received the RFA, it will contact all respondents determined to be reasonably responsive and may require additional points of clarification at that time.

Responses should be succinct but must include all information requested.

mailto:jamdomen@pa.gov