D3M in a Green Environment

If you're not feeling the green pressure already, you won't need to wait very long. Green IT, or eco-friendly information technology, has become a priority of government agencies world-wide. Surprisingly, the push is not merely political, but substantially economic. Green IT saves money. Look for the Obama administration to support, if not mandate, green IT as a follow-on to campaign promises. The next longitudinal data system grant applications may see requirements for green IT if the 2009 economic stimulus bill really does include $250 million for individual student records in education data systems. tree

ESP Solutions Group has looked at its own processes to determine just how green we are. We found that our premier product and service line marketed under the banner of the D3M FrameworkTM is substantially supportive of green IT fundamentals.

As context, let's summarize the traditional basic components of a green IT perspective for an agency.

For an education agency, you want to consider what is immediately under your own control. That's where the D3M Framework applies. The following principles of the D3M Framework support the goals of your agency's Green IT initiative.

  1. Reducing the human burden for reporting data, which in turn reduces the resources expended on information technology rather than upon the core mission of the agency
  2. Reducing the use of paper, ink, and toner by collecting and reporting data electronically
  3. Reducing the printing of documents, guides, and communications by publishing them online
  4. Providing for online training to reduce travel
  5. Sharing of data through electronic interoperability that reduces the physical representation of records and reports
  6. Providing portal services that create communities of interest within which information is shared virtually without travel, printing, or other use of physical resources
  7. Creating an overall information systems architecture with which to manage information resources for efficiency and sustainability
  8. Creating a governance structure with which to oversee the adoption of green policies and compliance with them
  9. Reducing the number of microcomputers and servers required to manage stovepipe systems by consolidating them into shared data stores
  10. Reducing the paper and ink required for the requesting and sending of official student records and transcripts by providing the National Transcript Center's electronic services nationwide

Green IT also encompasses hardware. Hardware vendors will continue to face stricter environmental standards and surplus hardware will find easier access to environmentally friendly recycling facilities.

How green are USED, NCES, and EDFacts? They are making the transition along with the rest of the IT world. The Common Core of Data (CCD), which began as all paper from collection to reports, is now merging into EDFacts, which could be paperless already if users didn't print their specifications and put them into binders. NCES and National Forum on Education Statistics publications are still printed, but they can be viewed (and of course printed) electronically on-line. The greenness is a beneficial consequence from the automation of processes initially intended to reduce the burden to the states for reporting data to USED.

Let's be Green Partners

ESP Solutions Group will continue being partners with education agencies in the design and implementation of efficient and useful decision support systems that meet all the goals for D3M. But in the process, let's all be cognizant of what we can do to create a green IT environment.