This page contains answers to actual and anticipated questions about the NSPA Data Standards Initiative.

Questions:

General Questions

What is the NSPA Data Standards Initiative?

In the broadest sense, the NSPA community is contributing to data modeling and data exchange standards related to scholarship program information.

Primarily, the NSPA is actively soliciting input for the NSPA Scholarship Program Data Standard, documented here. The NSPA Scholarship Program Data Standard is in production use today in the NSPA Exchange, but suitable for exchange of information between other systems. The data model defines the information that can be shared about a scholarship program, while XML and JSON specifications describe the technical details of how that information is shared between systems.

Some early stakeholders have indicated that there may be a role for the NSPA in coordinating the development of additional scholarship-related standards that don’t exist today. So, secondarily, the Data Standards Initiative will work with the NSPA community to identify, prioritize, and, if appropriate, develop additional standards. To be clear, “developing new standards” is not a goal of this Initiative — but the NSPA can play a coordination and publication role for additional standards, if appropriate.

Must I belong to an NSPA Member organization to participate?

We do expect that active participation in meetings and working groups will require an NSPA Membership. As of Q2-2021, exceptions are made on a case-by-case basis.

We will consider input and feedback on technical details from any source, including non-members.

You’re asking for contributions from the NSPA community. What, exactly, is a contribution?

Contributions consist of input, feedback, technical ideas, requests — any information conveyed to the NSPA and Data Standard Initiative members relating to scholarship data and data sharing.

Many (perhaps most) contributions from Initiative participants are expected to be technical in nature. Is the data type of an element correct? Is the model aligned with how data is generally organized in existing scholarship systems? Is there an existing standard we can use to define a value list instead of creating our own list?

But, contributions can be nontechnical in nature, and still provide significant value. For example, scholarship program directors can identify high-priority data elements that are missing from the NSPA Scholarship Program data model today. Scholarship administrators can hint at data that’s useful — but hard to collect.

Technical Questions

Do I need to be a programmer or technology professional to contribute?

No. It’s true that much of the expected working group activity will touch on technical issues, and meetings are expected to raise technical and operational matters. But, suggested additions to the NSPA Scholarship Program data model or requests for new elements to support reporting capabilities are in scope for this initiative, and that type of input requires no technical expertise.

In other words, you’re welcome to contribute even if you’re mostly concerned with the programmatic or reporting aspects of this work, but you may encounter brief periods of soul-crushing boredom as the group descends into a technical discussion.

What technical standards are relevant to this initiative?

At the moment, JSON (and JSON Schema) XML (and XSD), and OpenAPI are most relevant.

Logistical Questions

Are the data standards posted online?

Yes. Version 1.0d is in production in the NSPA Exchange, and is documented here. Version 1.0e, an update and the last draft before the full v1.0 release, is documented here. Both publications include the XML and JSON specifications and sample files.

Is there an issue tracking system?

Yes. The NSPA Tracker is a Jira-based system available to the general public. Issues related to the Scholarship Program Data Standard are tracked therein.

[ Q2-2021 NOTE: The Tracker is currently read-only, but we will provide creation and commenting to working group members should it seem useful. ]