U.S. Department of Education: Promoting Educational Excellence for all Americans

Education Resources Information Center (ERIC)

Exhibit 300: Capital Asset Plan and Business Case Summary
Part I: Summary Information And Justification

Section A: Overview

  1. Date of submission: Sep 8, 2008
  2. Agency: 018
  3. Bureau: 50
  4. Name of this Capital Asset: Education Resources Information Center (ERIC)
  5. Unique Project (Investment) Identifier: 018-50-01-05-01-1030-00
  6. What kind of investment will this be in FY2010? Mixed Life Cycle
  7. What was the first budget year this investment was submitted to OMB? FY2004
  8. Provide a brief summary and justification for this investment, including a brief description of how this closes in part or in whole an identified agency performance gap: The mission of ERIC is to provide a comprehensive, easy-to-use, searchable, Internet-based bibliographic and full-text database of education research and information for educators, researchers, and the general public. It is the only system within the Federal Governent that provides this service. Prior to the initiation of the ERIC database, there was no existing Internet based system with this functionality. This initiative achieves the following high-level results for the Department of Education and its customers: expansion of electronic government. This project uses the Internet to enable citizens to access information and transact business. The project supports agency objectives by providing access to more education information that is more comprehensively described and either provides the corresponding full-text articles or links to publishers so that individuals can purchase those materials if they choose. ERIC provides access to education materials and thus complies with legislation authorizing the Institute of Education Sciences within the U.S. Department of Education.
  9. Did the Agency's Executive/Investment Committee approve this request? yes
    1. If "yes," what was the date of this approval? Jun 14, 2007
  10. Did the Project Manager review this Exhibit? yes
  11. Contact information of Program/Project Manager?
    1. What is the current FAC-P/PM (for civilian agencies) or DAWIA (for defense agencies) certification level of the program/project manager? Waiver Issued
  1. Has the agency developed and/or promoted cost effective, energy efficient and environmentally sustainable techniques or practices for this project. no
    1. Will this investment include electronic assets (including computers)? yes
    2. Is this investment for new construction or major retrofit of a Federal building or facility? (answer applicable to non-IT assets only) no
      1. If "yes," is an ESPC or UESC being used to help fund this investment? [Not answered]
      2. If "yes," will this investment meet sustainable design principles? [Not answered]
      3. If "yes," is it designed to be 30% more energy efficient than relevant code? [Not answered]
  2. Does this investment directly support one of the PMA initiatives? yes
    Expanded E-Government
    1. Briefly and specifically describe for each selected how this asset directly supports the identified initiative(s)? This investment provides a unique service to individuals by providing Internet access to an education library of 1.2 million bibliographic records comprised of journal articles and non-journal documents such as contractor reports and conference papers. Collaborating with federal agencies, state agencies, and education associations, over 36,000 new records were added to ERIC in 2007. Redundancy has been addressed by supporting one web site rather than 35 and centralizing records processing.
  3. Does this investment support a program assessed using the Program Assessment Rating Tool (PART)? (For more information about the PART, visit www.whitehouse.gov/omb/part.) no
    1. If "yes," does this investment address a weakness found during a PART review? [Not answered]
    2. If "yes," what is the name of the PARTed program? [Not answered]
    3. If "yes," what rating did the PART receive? [Not answered]
  4. Is this investment for information technology? yes

For information technology investments only:

  1. What is the level of the IT Project? (per CIO Council PM Guidance) Level 3
  2. In addition to the answer in 11(a), what project management qualifications does the Project Manager have? (per CIO Council PM Guidance) (1) Project manager has been validated as qualified for this investment
  3. Is this investment or any project(s) within this investment identified as "high risk" on the Q4-FY 2008 agency high risk report (per OMB Memorandum M-05-23)? yes
  4. Is this a financial management system? no
    1. If "yes," does this investment address a FFMIA compliance area? [Not answered]
      1. If "yes," which compliance area: [Not answered]
      2. If "no," what does it address? [Not answered]
    2. If "yes," please identify the system name(s) and system acronym(s) as reported in the most recent financial systems inventory update required by Circular A-11 section 52 [Not answered]
  5. What is the percentage breakout for the total FY2010 funding request for the following?
Hardware 3
Software 2
Services 95
Other 0
  1. If this project produces information dissemination products for the public, are these products published to the Internet in conformance with OMB Memorandum 05-04 and included in your agency inventory, schedules and priorities? yes
  2. Contact information of individual responsible for privacy related questions:
   
   
   
   
  1. Are the records produced by this investment appropriately scheduled with the National Archives and Records Administration's approval? no
  2. Does this investment directly support one of the GAO High Risk Areas? no

Section B: Summary of Spending

  1.  

Table 1: SUMMARY OF SPENDING FOR PROJECT PHASES
(REPORTED IN MILLIONS)
(Estimates for BY+1 and beyond are for planning purposes only and do not represent budget decisions)
  PY-1 and earlier PY 2008 CY 2009 BY 2010 BY+1 2011 BY+2 2012 BY+3 2013 BY+4 and beyond Total
Planning: 0 0 0 0          
Acquisition: 10.55 6.93 0.25 0.26          
Subtotal Planning amp; Acquisition: 10.55 6.93 0.25 0.26          
Operations & Maintenance: 1.56 0.9 0.98 0.45          
TOTAL: 12.11 7.83 1.23 0.71          

Government FTE Costs should not be included in the amounts provided above.
Government FTE Costs 0 0.13 0.14 0.14          
Number of FTE represented by Costs: 0 1 1 1          
  1. Will this project require the agency to hire additional FTE's? no
    1. If "yes", How many and in what year? [Not answered]
  2. If the summary of spending has changed from the FY2009 President's budget request, briefly explain those changes: Changes in the contract budget for each year reflect changes in labor rates for the contractor's staff.

Section D: Performance Information

Performance Information Table
Fiscal Year Strategic Goal(s) Supported Measurement Area Measurement Grouping Measurement Indicator Baseline Target Actual Results
2004 Goal 1: Obejctive 5: Increase information and options for parents. Mission and Business Results Higher Education # of existing websites distributing ERIC information to the public. (IES legislation requires information dissemination in a cost effective and non-duplicative manner.) In October 2003, there were 35 websites that disseminated ERIC information. This number was reduced to 3 websites by January 2004. By September 1 2004, implement a single web site to disseminate ERIC information. The new ERIC website went live on September 1, 2004.
2004 Goal 1: Obejctive 5: Increase information and options for parents. Customer Results Customer Satisfaction Customer satisfaction with website A customer satisfaction survey was not completed prior to FY 2005, so it is not possible to identify a customer satisfaction baseline at this time. The survey will be conducted in FY 2005. In FY 2005, ERIC will implement a formal survey to assess customer satisfaction and receive customer feedback. The goal is to achieve a 70% customer satisfaction survey in FY 2005. In FY 2005, ERIC will implement a formal survey to assess customer satisfaction and receive customer feedback.In FY 2005, ERIC will implement a formal survey to assess customer satisfaction and receive customer feedback.
2004 Goal 1: Obejctive 5: Increase information and options for parents. Processes and Activities Cycle Time Average amount of time to enter a journal into the database after publication 6 ? 9 months Implement a website that will reduce the amount of time to enter a journal into the database after publication to 1 month. This level of improvement is not scheduled to occur until FY 2005. The ERIC website went live on September 1, 2004. Information continues to be added to the website.
2004 Goal 1: Obejctive 5: Increase information and options for parents. Technology Service Availability % of time the online system (website, database, and search engines) is available to the public. The ERICWeb site only became operational on September 1, 2004. Implement a new ERIC web site by September 1, 2004. ERICWeb site was opened on September 1, 2004 as scheduled with access to one million bibliographicrecords accessioned from 1966- July 2003.
2005 Goal 1: Obejctive 5: Increase information and options for parents. Mission and Business Results Higher Education % of full text material in areas of information mandated by legislation available to the public Approximately 1% of full text material was available to the public at the end of FY 2004. 100% of full text material will be available to the public by end of FY 2005 100 percent of the content acquired from ERIC approved sources under agreement has been processed as of September 1, 2005.
2005 Goal 1: Obejctive 5: Increase information and options for parents. Customer Results Customer Satisfaction Customer satisfaction with website A customer satisfaction survey was not completed prior to FY 2005, so it is not possible to identify a customer satisfaction baseline at this time. The survey will be conducted in FY 2005. Maintain at least a 70% customer satisfaction rating (this performance goal is based on industry best practices as identified by the American Customer Satisfaction Index for websites). ASCI survey, a random pop-up-up survey of 20 questions, was implemented on the ERIC Web site in September 2005. First score of 71% is above the average for government Web site using the ASCI.
2005 Goal 1: Obejctive 5: Increase information and options for parents. Processes and Activities Cycle Time Average amount of time to enter a journal into the database after publication 6 ? 9 months was the average amount of time to enter a journal into the database after publication during FY 2004 1 month Daily processing by September 1, 2005 amounted to 37,249 records. Of these 13,590 were released in completed state and 13,098 were released as "in progress" or stub records.
2005 Goal 1: Obejctive 5: Increase information and options for parents. Technology Service Availability % of time the online system (website, database, and search engines) is available to the public. 98% This baseline is only based on one month of data ? September 2004. 99% 99.5% as of September 2005
2006 Goal 1: Obejctive 5: Increase information and options for parents. Mission and Business Results Cultural and Historic Exhibition % of new content in all areas of information mandated by legislation available to the public Only a limited degree of full text material was available to the public at the end of FY 2004. 93% of full text material will be available to the public in FY 2006 For Q4 2006, the workflow system documents that 6,572 records( 5,787 EJs and 785 EDs) were published to ERIC. Overall, there were 4% more records published compared to the previous quarter. There were 15% more EJs; 40% fewer EDs.
2006 Goal 1: Obejctive 5: Increase information and options for parents. Customer Results Customer Complaints Customer satisfaction rate with website A customer satisfaction survey was not completed prior to FY 2005. The first overall rating score of 70 (FY2006) will serve as the baseline for the project. Maintain at least a 70% customer satisfaction rating (this performance goal is based on industry best practices as identified by the American Customer Satisfaction Index for websites) For the period 07/01/06 - 09/30/06, the overall satisfaction score was 68, a decline of three points from the previous quarter based on a sample of 1,550 responses.
2006 Goal 1: Obejctive 5: Increase information and options for parents. Processes and Activities Cycle Time Average amount of time to enter a journal into the database after publication 6 ? 9 months was the average amount of time to enter a journal into the database after publication during FY 2004 1 month For Q4 2006, 19% of the EJs were processed within 30 days; 30.6% within 60 days; 99% were published within 150 days. For EDs, 75.8% were processed within 30 days; 96.8% within 60 days, and 99% within 105 days.
2006 Goal 1: Obejctive 5: Increase information and options for parents. Technology Service Availability % of time the online system (website, database, and search engines) is available to the public. 98% This baseline is only based on one month of data ? September 2004. 99.5% Sampled "up" time was down 0.30% to 99.16% for the sample set for Q4 2006.
2007 Goal 1: Obejctive 5: Increase information and options for parents. Technology Service Availability % of time the online system (website, database, and search engine) is available to the public. 98% This baseline is only based on one month of data - September 2004. 99% For Q42006, the website and database were up 99.83% of time.
2007 Goal 1: Obejctive 5: Increase information and options for parents. Customer Results Customer Complaints Customer satisfaction rate with Web site. A customer satisfaction survey was not competed prior to FY 2005, so it is not possible to identify a customer satisfaction baseline at this time. The survey will be conducted in Fy 2005 and will serve as the baseline for the project. Maintain at least a 70% customer satifaction arting ( this performance goals is based on industry best practices as identified by the american Customer Satisfaction Index for Web sites). For December 2006, the customer satisfaction score was 68 based on 601 respondents to the survey.
2007 Goal 1: Obejctive 5: Increase information and options for parents. Mission and Business Results Cultural and Historic Exhibition % of new content in all areas of information mandated by legislation available to the public. Only a limited degree of full text material was available to the public at the end of FY 2004. 95% of full text material will be available to the public in FY 2006. A project initiated to digitize the backfile of about 339,000 full text documents. Once copyright permission is obtained from the authors, the ERIC web site will post additional documents for which permission to disseminate has been granted.
2007 Goal 1: Obejctive 5: Increase information and options for parents. Processes and Activities Cycle Time Average amount of time to enter a journal into the database after publication. 6 to 9 months was the average amount of time to enter a journal into the database after publication during FY 2004. 1 month For Q42006, the cycle time from date of acquisition to promotion to ERIC was as follows: for journals, 62.13 days; for non-journal records, the average was 80.19 days.
2008 Goal 1: Obejctive 5: Increase information and options for parents. Customer Results Customer Complaints Customer satisfaction rate with Web site. A customer satisfaction survey was not competed prior to FY 2005, so it is not possible to identify a customer satisfaction baseline at this time. The survey will be conducted in Fy 2005 and will serve as the baseline for the project. Maintain at least a 70.05% customer satifaction rating ( this performance goals is based on industry best practices as identified by the american Customer Satisfaction Index for Web sites). For April 2008, the customer satisfaction score was 72%, based on 796 respondents. The American Customer Satisfaction Index (used on the ERIC Web site) evaluates the following elements: content, functionality, look and feel, navigation, search, and
2008 Goal 1: Obejctive 5: Increase information and options for parents. Mission and Business Results Cultural and Historic Exhibition % of new content in all areas of information mandated by legislation available to the public. Only a limited degree of full text material was available to the public at the end of FY 2004. 100% of full text material will be available to the public in FY 2006. As of March 31, 2008, the digitization project is nearly finished and indicators are that it will be completed ahead of schedule. A total of 307,750 microfiche documents have been digitized, compressed, and attached to ERIC records. A total of 110,1
2008 Goal 1: Obejctive 5: Increase information and options for parents. Processes and Activities Cycle Time Average amount of time to enter a journal into the database after publication. 6 to 9 months was the average amount of time to enter a journal into the database after publication during FY 2004. 3 weeks For the period January 1- March 31, 2008, the average cycle time for all records to be published in ERIC was 11.48 days.
2008 Goal 1: Obejctive 5: Increase information and options for parents. Technology Service Availability % of time the online system (website, database, and search engine) is available to the public. 98% This baseline is only based on one month of data - September 2004. 99.5% The sampled uptime for the ERIC system was 99.84% for the period January 1 - March 31, 2008.
2009 Goal 1: Obejctive 5: Increase information and options for parents. Customer Results Customer Complaints Customer satisfaction rate with Web site. A customer satisfaction survey was not competed prior to FY 2005, so it is not possible to identify a customer satisfaction baseline at this time. The survey will be conducted in Fy 2005 and will serve as the baseline for the project. Maintain at least a 70.05% customer satifaction rating ( this performance goals is based on industry best practices as identified by the american Customer Satisfaction Index for Web sites). 12/2009
2009 Goal 1: Obejctive 5: Increase information and options for parents. Mission and Business Results Cultural and Historic Exhibition % of new content in all areas of information mandated by legislation available to the public. Only a limited degree of full text material was available to the public at the end of FY 2004. 100% of full text material will be available to the public in FY 2006. 12/2009
2009 Goal 1: Obejctive 5: Increase information and options for parents. Processes and Activities Cycle Time Average amount of time to enter a journal into the database after publication. 6 to 9 months was the average amount of time to enter a journal into the database after publication during FY 2004. 3 weeks 12/2009
2009 Goal 1: Obejctive 5: Increase information and options for parents. Technology Service Availability % of time the online system (website, database, and search engine) is available to the public. 98% This baseline is only based on one month of data - September 2004. 99.5% 12/2009
2010 Goal 1: Objective 5: Increase informationa and options for parents. Customer Results Customer Complaints Customer satisfaction rate with Web site. A customer satisfaction survey was not competed prior to FY 2005, so it is not possible to identify a customer satisfaction baseline at this time. The survey will be conducted in FY2005 and will serve as the baseline for the project. Maintain at least a 70.5% customer satisfaction rating (this performance goal is based on industry best practices as identified by the American Customer Satisfaction Index for Web Sites). TBD
2010 Goal 1: Objective 5: Increase information and options for parents. Mission and Business Results Cultural and Historic Preservation % of new content in all areas of information mandated by legislation available to the public. Only a limited degree of full text material was available to the public at the end of FY2004. 100% of full text material will be available to the pubic in FY2006 TBD
2010 Goal 1 Objective 5: Increase information and options for parents. Processes and Activities Cycle Time Average amount of time to enter a journal into the database after publication 6 to 9 months was the average amount of time to enter a journal into the database after publication during FY2004 3 weeks TBD
2010 Goal 1: Objective 5: Increase information and options for parents Technology Customer Satisfaction % of time the online system (Web site, database and search engine) s available to the public. 98% This baseline is only basd on one month of data- September 2004. 99.5% TBD

Section F: Enterprise Architecture (EA)

  1. Is this investment included in your agency's target enterprise architecture? yes
    1. If "no," please explain why? [Not answered]
  2. Is this investment included in the agency's EA Transition Strategy? yes
    1. If "yes," provide the investment name as identified in the Transition Strategy provided in the agency's most recent annual EA Assessment. Education Resources Information Center (ERIC)
    2. If "no," please explain why? [Not answered]
  3. Is this investment identified in a completed and approved segment architecture? yes
    1. If "yes," provide the six digit code corresponding to the agency segment architecture. The segment architecture codes are maintained by the agency Chief Architect. For detailed guidance regarding segment architecture codes, please refer to http://www.egov.gov/. 069-000

4. Service Component Reference Model (SRM) Table :

Agency Component Name Agency Component Description FEA SRM Service Type FEA SRM Component Service Component Reused Internal or External Reuse? BY Funding Percentage
Component Name UPI
Communications and Web Site Operations Information Specialists prepare and edit text for the Web site, make conference presentations and communicate with users groups, while graphic designers construct interface design revisions. Content Management Content Authoring [Not answered] [Not answered] No Reuse 1
Communications and Web Site Operations Information Specialists prepare and edit text for the Web site, make conference presentations and communicate with users groups, while graphic designers construct interface design revisions. Content Management Content Review and Approval [Not answered] [Not answered] No Reuse 1
Communications and Web Site Operations Information Specialists prepare and edit text for the Web site, make conference presentations and communicate with users groups, while graphic designers construct interface design revisions. Content Management Content Publishing and Delivery [Not answered] [Not answered] No Reuse 1
Processing (A&I), QC, and Data Entry Information Specialists and Lexicographers use publishers' journal data that is transformed for the ERIC software to create stub records, suggest metadata elements, and perform quality control for ERIC records. Document Management Document Referencing [Not answered] [Not answered] No Reuse 4
Maintenance Activities Technicians the software for the server, the ERIC database, the database search engine as well as the platforms and operating system to maintain the ERIC system's availability to the public 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Document Management Library / Storage [Not answered] [Not answered] No Reuse 8
Processing (A&I), QC, and Data Entry Information Specialists and Lexicographers use publishers' journal data that is transformed for the ERIC software to create stub records, suggest metadata elements, and perform quality control for ERIC records. Document Management Indexing [Not answered] [Not answered] No Reuse 10
Acquisitions and Curatorial Enhancements Curators use Web harvesters to cull grey literature and enhance the ERIC database with acquisitions for which copyright permission has been obtained. Knowledge Management Information Retrieval [Not answered] [Not answered] No Reuse 4
Processing (A&I), QC, And Data Entry Information Specialists and Lexicographers use publishers' journal data that is transformed for the ERIC software to create stub records, suggest metadata elements, and perform quality control for ERIC records. Knowledge Management Information Mapping / Taxonomy [Not answered] [Not answered] No Reuse 8
Communications and Web Site Operations Information Specialists prepare and edit text for the Web site, make conference presentations and communicate with users groups, while graphic designers construct interface design revisions. Knowledge Management Information Sharing [Not answered] [Not answered] No Reuse 2
Processing (A&I), QC, and Data Entry Information Specialists and Lexicographers use publishers' journal data that is transformed for the ERIC software to create stub records, suggest metadata elements, and perform quality control for ERIC records. Knowledge Management Categorization [Not answered] [Not answered] No Reuse 8
Processing (A&I), QC, and Data Entry Information Specialists and Lexicographers use publishers' journal data that is transformed for the ERIC software to create stub records, suggest metadata elements, and perform quality control for ERIC records. Data Management Meta Data Management [Not answered] [Not answered] No Reuse 8
Acquisitions and Curatorial Enhancements Curators use Web harvesters to cull grey literature and enhance the ERIC database with acquisitions for which copyright permission has been obtained. Data Management Loading and Archiving [Not answered] [Not answered] No Reuse 4
Processing (A&I), QC, and Data Entry Information Specialists and Lexicographers use publishers' journal data that is transformed for the ERIC software to create stub records, suggest metadata elements, and perform quality control for ERIC records. Records Management Document Classification [Not answered] [Not answered] No Reuse 4
Processing (A&I), QC, And Data Entry Information Specialists and Lexicographers use publishers' journal data that is transformed for the ERIC software to create stub records, suggest metadata elements, and perform quality control for ERIC records. Records Management Record Linking / Association [Not answered] [Not answered] No Reuse 8
Acquisitions and Curatorial Enhancements Curators use Web harvesters to cull grey literature and enhance the ERIC database with acquisitions for which copyright permission has been obtained. Customer Preferences Subscriptions [Not answered] [Not answered] No Reuse 3
Processing (A&I), QC, and Data Entry Information Specialists and Lexicographers use publishers' journal data that is transformed for the ERIC software to create stub records, suggest metadata elements, and perform quality control for ERIC records. Document Management Classification [Not answered] [Not answered] No Reuse 4
Acquisitions and Curatorial Enhancements Curators use Web harvesters to cull grey literature and enhance the ERIC database with acquisitions for which copyright permission has been obtained. Document Management Document Conversion [Not answered] [Not answered] No Reuse 4
Communications and Web Site Operations Information Specialists prepare and edit text for the Web site, make conference presentations and communicate with users groups, while graphic designers construct interface design revisions. Knowledge Management Knowledge Distribution and Delivery [Not answered] [Not answered] No Reuse 2
Search Enhancements Technicians shall revisit relevance ranking and search performance to ensure that system features optimize user efficiency. Search Pattern Matching [Not answered] [Not answered] No Reuse 2
Search Enhancements Technicians shall revisit relevance ranking and search performance to ensure that system features optimize user efficiency. Search Precision / Recall Ranking [Not answered] [Not answered] No Reuse 3
Abstracting Enhancements Structured abstracts for research documents can be created by contributors online, and an instructional video assists contributors in defining metadata elements describing the document. Knowledge Management Knowledge Capture [Not answered] [Not answered] No Reuse 2
Steering Committee & Content Expert Operations Experts in education research and methodology and major technical aspects of an online database advise the contractor on reseach and development issues. Management of Processes Governance / Policy Management [Not answered] [Not answered] No Reuse 2
Project Management Planned and Reporting This component includes scheduling and defining work activities, level of effort, and reporting to meet contract deliverables. Management of Processes Program / Project Management [Not answered] [Not answered] No Reuse 1
Usability Testing Usability test plans are implemented approximately three times annually and results are documented to improve user interfaces and augment search performance. Development and Integration Instrumentation and Testing [Not answered] [Not answered] No Reuse 6

 

5. Technical Reference Model (TRM) Table:

FEA SRM Component FEA TRM Service Area FEA TRM Service Category FEA TRM Service Standard Service Specification
Knowledge Distribution and Delivery Service Platform and Infrastructure Database / Storage Database SQL server 2000
Knowledge Distribution and Delivery Service Access and Delivery Service Requirements Legislative / Compliance Sec. 172 of Public Law 107-279, Education Sciences Reform Act
Knowledge Distribution and Delivery Service Access and Delivery Service Requirements Authentication / Single Sign-on BEA LDAP; v8. 1.6; Windows 2003 Active Directory
Knowledge Distribution and Delivery Service Access and Delivery Service Requirements Hosting Dedicated
Knowledge Distribution and Delivery Service Access and Delivery Service Transport Service Transport Cisco CSS 11503 Load balancer; Microsoft Internet Information Server v6.0; Microsoft Internet FTP Server v6.0
Knowledge Distribution and Delivery Service Platform and Infrastructure Support Platforms Independent Platform Java 2 Platform Enterprise Edition (J2EE) v1.5
Knowledge Distribution and Delivery Service Platform and Infrastructure Database / Storage Storage HP MSA1000; HP NAS HEAD (HP ProLiant DL580 G2)
Knowledge Distribution and Delivery Service Platform and Infrastructure Delivery Servers Web Servers Internet Information Server v6.0
Knowledge Distribution and Delivery Service Platform and Infrastructure Delivery Servers Application Servers Apache Tomcat v5.5.10
Knowledge Distribution and Delivery Service Platform and Infrastructure Software Engineering Integrated Development Environment BEA WebLogic Workshop v8.1.6; Eclipse v3.1
Knowledge Distribution and Delivery Service Platform and Infrastructure Software Engineering Software Configuration Management Atlassian JIRA; Subversion
Knowledge Distribution and Delivery Service Platform and Infrastructure Software Engineering Test Management WebQA by Watchfire; Apache J Unit; Apache J Meter; Apache J Test; Badboy; Selenium
Knowledge Distribution and Delivery Service Platform and Infrastructure Software Engineering Modeling Documentum Workflow v5.3; Argo UML
Knowledge Distribution and Delivery Service Platform and Infrastructure Hardware / Infrastructure Servers / Computers HP ProLiant DL380 G3 ; DELL (6450, 2650, 2550)
Knowledge Distribution and Delivery Service Platform and Infrastructure Hardware / Infrastructure Local Area Network (LAN) Gigabit network
Knowledge Distribution and Delivery Service Platform and Infrastructure Hardware / Infrastructure Network Devices / Standards Switches (Cisco 6513) , firewalls (Nokia IP530) from data network
Knowledge Distribution and Delivery Component Framework User Presentation / Interface Static Display Hyper Text Markup Language (HTML)
Knowledge Distribution and Delivery Component Framework User Presentation / Interface Dynamic Server-Side Display Java Server Pages (JSP)
Knowledge Distribution and Delivery Component Framework User Presentation / Interface Content Rendering Cascading Style Sheets (CSS)
Knowledge Distribution and Delivery Component Framework Business Logic Independent Platform Javascript; Java Servlet; Java Portal
Knowledge Distribution and Delivery Component Framework Data Management Database Connectivity JDBC;OLE/DB
Knowledge Distribution and Delivery Service Interface and Integration Interoperability Data Format / Classification XML;PDF
Knowledge Distribution and Delivery Service Interface and Integration Interoperability Data Types / Validation XML Schema
Knowledge Distribution and Delivery Service Interface and Integration Interoperability Data Transformation eXtensible Stylesheet Language Transform (XSLT)
Knowledge Distribution and Delivery Service Platform and Infrastructure Support Platforms Dependent Platform Microsoft Windows 2003
Knowledge Distribution and Delivery Service Platform and Infrastructure Delivery Servers Portal Servers BEA WebLogic Portal v8.1.6
  1. Will the application leverage existing components and/or applications across the Government (i.e., USA.Gov, Pay.Gov, etc)? no
    1. If "yes," please describe. [Not answered]

Part II: Planning, Acquisition And Performance Information

Section A: Alternatives Analysis

  1. Did you conduct an alternatives analysis for this investment? yes
    1. If "yes," provide the date the analysis was completed? Mar 5, 2008
    2. If "no," what is the anticipated date this analysis will be completed? [Not answered]
    3. If no analysis is planned, please briefly explain why: [Not answered]

2. Alternatives Analysis Results:

Alternative Analyzed Description of Alternative Risk Adjusted Lifecycle Costs estimate Risk Adjusted Lifecycle Benefits estimate
1. Status Quo: Maintenance of Current System by contractor and government FTE Status quo. A system was developed by a contractor to overcome the deficiencies mentioned below. This system has been in place since 2004. This alternative uses contractor labor and skills, and one government FTE. Market research comprised of program assessment and staff analysis revealed the following problems with the existing system:1 Lack of design uniformity, 2 Focus on the gray literature,3 Long delays in bringing information online, 4 Reliance on abstracts and absence of full-text acces 7.5 1
2. Development of current system by government FTE only This alternative relies on the expertise of government CORs and past system reports and previous RFPs to resolve problems in the existing system especially the lack of design uniformity, and long delays in bringing information online, and inefficient use of resource. The weaknesses mentioned can be efficiently addressed through developing an IT solution in-house. This alternative proposes use of government FTE and no contractor support. 10.02 1.39
3. Enhancement/development of current system by contractor and government FTE This alternative relies on the expertise of government CORs and past system reports and previous RFPs to resolve problems in the existing system especially the lack of design uniformity, and long delays in bringing information online, and inefficient use of resource. The weaknesses mentioned can be efficiently addressed through developing an IT solution in-house. This alternative proposes use of government FTE and no contractor support. 6.37 0.89
4. Enhancement/development of system with multiple contractors and government FTE Multiple contractors could implement this alternative that proposes the use of a combination of various vendor specialties, one focusing on the intellectual content and another delivering IT. Requirements could be developed and documented through separate procurements and one government FTE. 15 2.08
  1. Which alternative was selected by the Agency's Executive/Investment Committee and why was it chosen? The alternative 1, maintenance of the current system by a contractor, with Government FTE assistance and oversight, provides the best value to the government in response to the request for Proposals (RFP) in the new ERIC initiative. This alternative provides benefits critical to achieving the ERIC mission, such as a user-friendly ERIC library that is comprehensive, easy-to-use, searchable, Internet-based bibliographic and full-text database of education research and information for educators, researchers, and the general public.For Alternative 2, 3, and 4, the Department of Education does not have staff with expertise in engineering, programming, and the information technology specialization that is required to develop and operate such a complicated system. Moreover, the most economical alternative was to competitively award the project to contractors with staff experienced in architecture and systems maintenance.
    1. What year will the investment breakeven? (Specifically, when the budgeted costs savings execced the cumulative costs.) 2020
  2. What specific qualitative benefits will be realized? Measurable qualitative benefits towards Goal 1: Objective 5: Increase information and options for parents. The public can now access the ERIC system 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Through put time for record publishing has decreased from approximately nine months to less than thirty days. The number of records published to ERIC has increased for each of the last five quarters in 2006-2007 so that roughly 3,000 new entries are added every month with updates made weekly. More than 63,000 new records (2004-2007) were released in ERIC as of May 2007.

5. Federal Quantitative Benefits ($millions):

  Budgeted Cost Savings Cost Avoidance Justification for Budgeted Cost Savings Justification for Budgeted Cost Avoidance
PY-1 and Prior  
PY  
CY  
BY  
BY+1 1 0 As documented in Section II.A.2, there is a resulting cost savings of one million dollars. [Not answered]
BY+2  
BY+3  
BY+4 and Beyond  
Total LCC Benefit 1 0 LCC = Life-cycle cost
  1. Will the selected alternative replace a legacy system in-part or in-whole? no
    1. If "yes," are the migration costs associated with the migration to the selected alternative included in this investment, the legacy investment, or in a separate migration investment? [Not answered]
    2. If "yes," please provide the following information:

List of Legacy Investment or Systems
Name of the Legacy Investment or Systems UPI if available Date of the System Retirement
There are no Legacy Investment or Systems.

Section B: Risk Management (All Capital Assets)

  1. Does the investment have a Risk Management Plan? yes
    1. If "yes," what is the date of the plan? May 20, 2008
    2. Has the Risk Management Plan been significantly changed since last year's submission to OMB? no
    3. If "yes," describe any significant changes: [Not answered]
  2. If there currently is no plan, will a plan be developed? [Not answered]
    1. If "yes," what is the planned completion date? [Not answered]
    2. If "no," what is the strategy for managing the risks? [Not answered]
  3. Briefly describe how investment risks are reflected in the life cycle cost estimate and investment schedule: Monthly Earned Value Management (EVM) Reports document performance on cost and schedule for risk factors such as processing (indexing and abstracting journal and non-journal library records), technical support, and IT security. For example, the EVM Report for April 2008 summarized the cost variance at -3.28% and the schedule variance at -4.70%. Other critical performance metrics are montiored, documented, and reported to the Project Manager weekly by a third party Quality Assurance contractor.

Section C: Cost and Schedule Performance (All Capital Assets)

  1. Does the earned value management system meet the criteria in ANSI/EIA Standard - 748? yes
  2. Is the CV% or SV% greater than ± 10%? (CV%= CV/EV x 100; SV%= SV/PV x 100) no
    1. If "yes," was it the? [Not answered]
    2. If "yes," explain the causes of the variance: [Not answered]
    3. If "yes," describe the corrective actions [Not answered]
  3. Has the investment re-baselined during the past fiscal year? no
    1. If "yes," when was it approved by the agency head? [Not answered]

4. Comparison of Initial Baseline and Current Approved Baseline:

Description of Milestone Initial Baseline Current Baseline Current Baseline Variance  
Planned Completion Date Total Cost ($M) Estimated Completion Date
Planned:Actual		 Total Cost ($M)
Planned:Actual		 Schedule:Cost
(# days:$M)		 Percent Complete
FY 08 Development, Modernization, and enhancements Sep 30, 2008 250 Sep 30, 2008 [Not answered] 250 [Not answered] 0 [Not answered] 0
FY08 Operations and Maintenance Sep 30, 2008 853.2 Sep 30, 2008 [Not answered] 853.2 [Not answered] [Not answered] [Not answered] 0
FY08 IT Security Sep 30, 2008 129.97 Sep 30, 2008 [Not answered] 129.97 [Not answered] [Not answered] [Not answered] 0
FY09 Development, Modernization, and Enhancements Mar 11, 2009 110.96 Mar 11, 2009 [Not answered] 110.96 [Not answered] [Not answered] [Not answered] 0
FY09 IT Operations and Maintenance Mar 11, 2009 390.98 Mar 11, 2009 [Not answered] 390.98 [Not answered] [Not answered] [Not answered] 0
FY09 IT Security Mar 11, 2009 60.9 Mar 11, 2009 [Not answered] 60.9 [Not answered] [Not answered] [Not answered] 0

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