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EMIS Reporting Resources at Your Fingertips

The Department of Education and Workforce (DEW) offers a variety of helpful resources available on their website to support districts in reporting financial and staff data to EMIS for the fiscal year. The EMIS Communications and Information is a central hub for EMIS related information including the following links… all of which are extremely helpful during financial (H) and staff (L) reporting periods.

• EMIS Data Collection Calendars: DEW provides a draft calendar that outlines the various data collections that take place throughout the fiscal year. The document contains three formats:

  • Page 1: divided by major data grouping

  • Page 2: sorted by open date

  • Page 3: sorted by close date.

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• EMIS Newsflash: DEW EMIS Newsflashes announce when the Final Staff & Course (L) collection and Financial (H) collection are open. Important details of the collection, such as the data requirements and collection window, is included in the linked ‘Release Notes’.

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• EMIS Validation and Report Explanations provides detailed EMIS report explanations on the reports returned from DEW based on the staff (L) and financial (H) data submitted. These resources may help users interpret EMIS reports and understand any errors or discrepancies.

  • Expenditure explains the information included in the following financial (H) reports that are available under the Level 2 Reports area of your ‘Reports’ tab in the EMIS data collector.

    • EXPD-001 Expenditure Detail Report

    • EXPD-002 Expenditure Summary Report by Category

    • EXPD-003 Expenditure Summary Report by Sub-Category

  • General Issues (GNIS-xxx): explains the information included in the ‘General Issues Data Report’ that is also listed under the Level 2 Reports area in the data collector. The report contains information about assessment, staff, student, and/or financial data reported through EMIS.

  • Staff Missing, Level 1: explains the information in the ‘Staff Missing Leve 1 Error Report’ that is generated in the data collector once the Final Staff & Course Collection (L) is collected.

• Current EMIS manual is the authoritative source for the most up-to-date EMIS content. The manual is divided into chapters.

  • Staff Records are included in Chapter 3 of the EMIS manual

  • Financial Records are included in Chapter 6 of the EMIS manual

• EMIS Learning Library includes some helpful and commonly used resources available to assist with reporting and reviewing your EMIS data. It includes a library of EMIS training videos covering some of the topics mentioned above such as the EMIS manual, EMIS reporting questions, an intro to EMIS reports, etc.

• EMIS Changes: outlines proposed and scheduled EMIS changes by fiscal year. These pages are updated regularly and should be reviewed frequently for new developments.

In 2024, State Software conducted sessions with ITC staff to review EMIS topics related to USAS and USPS. The USAS support team covered areas such as the MOE, grants balancing, and reconciling Period H with USAS. The USPS support team reviewed common EMIS reporting errors and how to prepare for end-of-year EMIS submissions. Both the USAS & USPS recordings are available on SSDT’s YouTube channel.

Your Guide to USAS Tools for AOS USAS Manual Changes 

The Auditor of State (AOS) recently released an updated version of their USAS manual, along with a redline version and FAQs, available under the Publications & Manuals section of their website. We strongly encourage you to thoroughly review Appendix A in their USAS manual as it provides a detailed explanation of the recent changes presented during the OASBO Annual Conference (and the April 30th OASBO webinar). In fact, the content in Appendix A is organized in the same sequence as the AOS presentations for easier reference.

In response to the AOS USAS manual updates, State Software has received inquiries on the status of the USAS software and its alignment with the changes. Below is a summary of current capabilities and planned enhancements:

Can I begin creating General Fund new predefined special cost centers (9xxx ending in X-Z)?

Yes. While the required usage of these new General Fund SCCs (9xxx ending in X-Z) has been extended to July 1, 2026 (FY27), USAS already permits their creation based on existing SCC parameters. To assist users and prevent accidental misuse, SSDT will be implementing warnings/confirmation messages in the software when a new cash account is created using a SCC in the new 9xxx X-Z range. Until these updates are released, districts may still create accounts in this range but no specific warnings or confirmation will appear.

USAS offers the ability to add new accounts via spreadsheet using the Utilities > Mass Load option for users with appropriate level of access. The documentation has recently been updated to include detailed information on the primary import fields and has included import templates with field headers. If revenue or expenditure accounts are loaded for a new Fund-SCC, the cash account and any necessary appropriation accounts will be automatically created.

Has USAS been updated with the new fund, function, object and receipt codes listed in the Appendix A that can be used at the start of FY26?

State Software has recently received the official dimension code changes from AOS and we are actively working to implement them. They are scheduled to be implemented on the 2025.11.0 release (June 20th) or earlier if possible. Specific details on the code changes will be provided in the release notes as software updates are being implemented.

What about the grant funds AOS has identified that are scheduled to be deleted after FY2026. How is the software going to handle these?

A list of the state and federal grants funds scheduled to be deleted after FY2026 are listed in Appendix A. Please refer to the Effective Date and Action Items information provided by AOS on how to address activity or remaining balances in these funds before the end of FY2026. State Software will update USAS to ensure these funds are no longer valid after FY2026.

Appendix A notes that fund change functionality is not currently available in State Software. Can you provide more information?

A new feature allowing districts to change funds from one code to another is scheduled to be completed for release near the end of calendar year 2025. This fund change functionality will create the cash account and its underlying accounts (appropriation, expenditure and revenue accounts) along with making transaction updates (similar to the current Account Change program). 

 The initial implementation of Fund Change will behave similar to the classic FNDCHG in that:

• The cash account you are changing TO cannot already exist

• All old accounts will be made inactive, similar to how Account Change behaves

• The anticipated fund change program will not allow an existing Fund-SCC to merge into another existing Fund-SCC. The new Fund-SCC must NOT exist.

If there are existing funds your district plans to use fund change with, we recommend refraining from manually creating accounts for the new target Fund-SCC to preserve eligibility for the anticipated fund change process. Any new Fund-SCC you do not plan to use Fund Change for can be created for use starting July 1, 2025.

Please refer to the AOS USAS Manual Appendix A and FAQ document for specific information about changes to accounts. Not all changes will require the fund change process in the USAS software. Alternative options include:

• Distributions/Error Corrections can be used to re-assign expenditures that were originally charged to a different account.

• New accounts can be created manually or via Mass Load

• Mass change can be used to inactivate all accounts associated with inactive cash accounts.

For questions related to the AOS USAS Manual, please contact usasmanualsupport@ohioauditor.gov. For questions about State Software, please reach out to your ITC for further assistance on software usage to accomplish these changes.

Release Recap Reminder

Beginning 2023, SSDT introduced a monthly Release Recap session designed to keep ITC staff informed of the latest updates, enhancements and new features added to SSDT applications over the prior month. While SSDT continues its regular biweekly software release schedule, each accompanied by detailed release notes linked to corresponding Jira issues, these monthly sessions offer a more accessible and summarized view of recent changes. Each session is supported by a summary document that highlights the updates across all SSDT applications. During the recap, we provide a live demo offering a visual understanding of the changes that took place. The monthly recap documents are located here in the wiki.

Below is a snippet from the April recap document where we include a link to the recorded session and a clickable table of contents that allows you to jump directly to the information for a specific application.

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Each application section displays a table listing the release dates, application version, and type of release (regular or hotfix). The version number links directly to the detailed release notes in the wiki.  Below each table is a breakdown of changes categorized by New Features, Improvements, Bug Fixes and Internal Updates or Patches. Occasional screenshots may be included to help illustrate the changes.

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• SSDT Wiki

• April Release Recap

• Newsletters Home Page

• SSDT Documentation

• USAS Documentation

• USPS Documentation

• Inventory Documentation

• ESS Documentation

• SSDT YouTube Channel

• USPS YouTube Playlist

• USAS YouTube Playlist

• Inventory YouTube Playlist

• ESS YouTube Playlist

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Please review the feature article (on the left side of the newsletter) explaining our monthly Release Recaps. With frequent updates happening every release, our monthly recap recordings are designed to give you a concise user-friendly overview, making it easier to stay current with all that’s evolving in our applications. Each month’s recap document in the wiki includes a link to the recorded session. The recordings are also available in our YouTube channel under the Release Recaps playlist.

Did You Know?

Coming Soon to a District Near You….

Now is the perfect time to be thinking about your upcoming annual reporting to STRS.

• Did last year’s STRS advance balance back to zero?

After the final payroll of the fiscal year is processed, it is suggested you go to System>Configuration>STRS Advance Configuration and verify the following:

• Is the Advance Mode checkbox unmarked?

• Is the Amount Paid Back field blank?

If this is not something you have checked thus far, now is the perfect time to do so. If you find your STRS Advance Configuration screen does not look like the picture above, please reach out to your ITC as soon as possible.

Then, add a reminder to your calendar to check this information after the final payroll is processed for FY25.

Did You Know?

Payment Printing Enhancement

The total of all employer paid amounts and employer error adjustments can now be printed on your direct deposits and physical checks. If this is something you wish to add to your pay slips, please reach out to your ITC for assistance.

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The SSDT Support Team maintains a dedicated wiki page for the FYE meetings we hold with ITC staff. This page includes a variety of helpful resources to assist with the FYE closing processes for USAS, USPS and Inventory. Resources include:

• Powerpoint Presentation used during our FYE meeting

• Links to our Generic Closing Checklists

• References to supporting documentation within our SSDT wiki

• External resources links, including those for IRS and STRS

Please note: The Powerpoint slides and closing checklists available on our wiki are generic resources designed to help explain the closing process and support ITCs in developing their own localized FYE procedures. Your ITC may provide customized versions of these materials based on their policies and procedures.  When closing the fiscal year, always refer to and follow the specific instructions and materials provided by your ITC.