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Poway's finances earn top grades with SAS®At the Poway Unified School District, “learning drives the budget” with SAS Financial Management. The solution helps the district proactively manage the finances needed to educate its 33,000 students. Working with one version of financial data, administrators are more engaged in the budget process. The school district’s fiscal responsibility was honored by the San Diego Taxpayers Association with its Gold Watchdog Award. 
Check out this video to learn more about Poway Unified School District and its successes with SAS. View Video (Runtime: 2 mins., 43 secs.)You have questions; our customers have answers. Check out this video Q & A. 
Don Phillips View Video 
John Collins View Video (Requires Windows Media Player 6.4.7 or higher or RealPlayer 6 or higher )
“We couldn’t plan and analyze the data through trending and forecast modeling using our financial accounting system,’’ says Randie Allen, Chief Financial Officer. “In addition, we couldn’t test financial assumptions. Instead, we had 200 pages of static reports. It was impossible to manage.’’ Today, Allen can be proactive in allocating resources. There is one version of the budget, and it is updated daily and available online to administrators in an easy-to-read format. The financial accounting, payroll and budget systems are integrated into SAS Financial Management. Using alerts, Allen can see whether an area is exceeding budget and why. In bargaining unit negotiations, both unions and the district look at the same data, so negotiations complete faster. Administrators are also engaged in the budget process because they can track changes and receive specific data about how funds were spent. Allen is able to answer more questions about the cost effectiveness of district programs by linking budget information to student achievement data. This is particularly critical in high-cost areas like special education or reading intervention programs. She can also more easily estimate fixed costs once a new school opens and track construction costs. “There is no other district in California that has the financial decision-making power that we do because of SAS Financial Management, ’’ says John Collins, Deputy Superintendent. “Now we’ve got the same powerful tool corporations use. Best of all, we let our children’s needs drive the budget, rather than the budget controlling what we can do for our children.” Copyright © SAS Institute Inc. All Rights Reserved. |
Poway Unified School District
Challenge:
The Poway Unified School district needed a better way to manage finances.
Solution:
SAS Financial Management gives Poway the kind of transparent “one version of the truth” tool that corporations rely on. The district also uses SAS for Performance Management to track student data.
Benefits:
Principals are engaged in the budget process, and negotiations with bargaining units go faster. The school district received an award from a taxpayers' watchdog group. It is now implementing SAS Human Capital Management.
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Regulators, the government and citizens all scrutinize the Poway Unified School District’s $254 million annual budget. Taxpayers want the best possible education for the least amount of money. Under state funding formulas, Poway receives less money per child because it was a rural school district when the funding formulas were developed. Although the district was meeting its obligations before turning to SAS Financial Management, it believed there was room for improvement.