D.C. schools officials will spend about $2 million to sort, digitize and file millions of pages of personnel records that have languished for years, officials said yesterday.
Since late June, workers for two local firms have spent 16 hours a day, seven days a week digitally scanning and filing 4.6 million documents found boxed in the file room at the school system’s Northeast headquarters, said D.C. Chief Technology Officer Vivek Kundra.
“We’re taking that file room and taking it to the digital world by taking every document, indexing it and making sure that those documents are searchable online,” Mr. Kundra said during a tour yesterday of the filing operation at D.C. Public Schools headquarters in Northeast.
Schools Chancellor Michelle A. Rhee and D.C. Mayor Adrian M. Fenty scheduled the tour after announcing Monday the school system found the records sitting in a room at the central office in June. The documents included such personnel information as hiring records and tax statements.
The chancellor’s special assistant, Steve Weber, said about 2 million pages have been scanned to date.
Some of the documents date back several years. Mrs. Rhee said she found a 1998 memorandum from retired Gen. Julius W. Becton to Arlene Ackerman, both former school superintendents.
The operation should be complete by mid-September, and the files will be stored on the city’s data server, Mr. Kundra said. The hard copies will be filed in the storage room, and useless documents will be shredded.
“We have not just put in place systems to make sure that we’re actually filing these papers, but we decided to take it a step higher than that and actually digitize all of the files as well,” Mrs. Rhee said.
Officials said they hope the new system will streamline operations and eliminate payroll problems that for years have kept teachers from getting paid on time.
“Everywhere that the chancellor and our facilities director are going these days they’re having to turn around decades of a lack of a sense of urgency and a lack of attention to detail on really the basics of running a government agency,” Mr. Fenty said.
The mayor said he prioritized the filing project about six weeks ago because it was identified as a “material weakness” in an independent audit released earlier this year.
Officials are awaiting the results of two forensic audits — conducted by the firms Alvarez & Marsal and McKinsey & Co. — that were commissioned in June to improve the school system’s efficiency. Mrs. Rhee said she will consider retaining the firms to implement their recommendations.
Sorting the documents remains one of several problems Mrs. Rhee has been battling since she was hired in June.
Three weeks ago, Mrs. Rhee announced that thousands of textbooks had been delivered to the wrong schools. Also, as of Monday 25 teaching positions were not filled, and 70 excess teachers needed placement.
Mrs. Rhee created a task force late last month to resolve the textbook issue and ensure new teachers are paid on time.
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