Military Enlistment Data Access to Lift Student Success (MEDALS)

The Department of War, through the Defense Human Resources Activity and Defense Manpower Data Center, is issuing a Request for Information to obtain technical and operational input from qualified vendors capable of serving as a secure data intermediary between States, U.S. territories, federal agencies, and DoD, with responses due May 22, 2026. This is market research only; responses do not obligate the government to issue a subsequent solicitation.

The MEDALS program aims to establish a secure, replicable methodology for confirming military service and careers as post-secondary outcomes to support state education agencies' counseling, curriculum development, accountability, and reporting. Respondents must address capability to manage unidirectional and potentially bi-directional data exchanges involving secure receipt, validation, formatting, de-identification, aggregation, matching, and disaggregation of student-level high school graduate data.

Vendors must demonstrate compliance with federal security requirements including FISMA, DoDI 8500.01 and 8510.01, DoD Cloud Computing Security Requirements Guide, NIST standards (SP 800-53, 800-61, 800-88), FIPS 140-2/140-3, FedRAMP (if cloud-based), FERPA, Privacy Act of 1974, and Computer Matching and Privacy Protection Act of 1988. Responses must address data matching methodologies (PII-based, SSN-based, privacy-preserving/de-identified, or hybrid), information security architecture, encryption protocols for data at rest and in transit, role-based access controls, incident response procedures, and U.S.-based data residency. Vendors must also propose hub-and-spoke or alternative agreement structures, describe prior experience with federal-to-state intermediary services and data governance frameworks, and address scalability to nationwide participation. NAICS code 518210 (Data Processing, Hosting, and Related Services) and PSC code DH10 apply. The RFI is closely related to an ongoing Council of Chief State School Officers pilot program for standardizing student military service data.