How Frontline expanded self-service reporting for Texas school districts with Jaspersoft

The Challenge

Frontline saw an opportunity to make flexible reporting easier for more district users

Frontline Education provides software for K-12 public, private, and charter school districts, with products covering student management, business operations, and people and human resources (HR). Vice President of Client Success - Service Carlene Kirkpatrick and her team oversee the implementation, training, enablement, and other services Frontline delivers to customers.

Texas school districts rely on Frontline's enterprise resource planning (ERP) solution to report on finance, payroll, and position management. Reports help the districts understand operations, make decisions, and meet state-specific challenges. For instance, school leaders use reported data to identify vacancies, recruiting needs, and spending concerns, and determine whether budgets are on track.

When Carlene joined Frontline, the company was already using Jaspersoft's reporting software. Frontline wanted to help more customers use that data independently by giving them an easier starting point for building and customizing reports.

Starting a report from scratch was too high a barrier for inexperienced users. Some districts instead worked across multiple spreadsheets and tried combining information manually. Without stronger self-service reporting, customers relied more heavily on Frontline's service teams whenever they needed to make changes or custom reports. 

"One of the major pain points for our districts was reporting. We had Jaspersoft, but we were underutilizing it. We had all this data at our fingertips, so the question became: How can we make it more accessible for districts to quickly generate a report or build a dashboard they can really use?"
‍— Carlene Kirkpatrick, Vice President of Client Success - Service 

Frontline needed easier reporting that preserved the flexibility that different districts required. The goal was to make it easier for customers to access, understand, and use their data independently. 

The Solution

Using Jaspersoft, Frontline created a more accessible, self-service reporting experience

Frontline brought together its technical and services teams with Jaspersoft to expand self-service reporting around districts’ most common needs. Together, they identified ways to help customers get started more easily while preserving the flexibility to build customized reports.

This model lets Frontline offer flexible reporting without its services team needing to build every report for districts. Now, districts can change reports, explore data, and go deeper when needed without depending on a developer.

"By leveraging Jaspersoft, we've given districts the power and autonomy to manage their own reporting. We can help coach and enable them, but they can change what they need or dive deeper into the data on their own."

How Frontline uses Jaspersoft today

Frontline uses Jaspersoft within its Texas ERP offerings to turn HR, position management, finance, and payroll data into reports for customers. School districts can use standard reports, build ad hoc reports, create dashboards, or create more detailed, pixel-perfect reports, depending on their needs and experience. More advanced users can even create their own reports or dashboards and share what they've learned with other districts through Frontline's user community. 

"Through Jaspersoft, districts can customize the reports they need and see the data in the format they need. We can build dashboards and ad hoc views that help them hone in on the data and take action."

HR teams, school administrators, finance teams, payroll teams, and other district leaders can use Jaspersoft to:

• Analyze budget performance and variance
• Bring data from different parts of Frontline together into one view
• See schools or departments with open positions
• Understand employee locations and experience
• Create dashboards for specific roles, such as giving a principal the information relevant to their school

Pre-built domains give customers an easier place to start

Many districts need similar information about employees, vacancies, locations, and experience. Making every district build their own datasets from scratch created unnecessary work and slowed adoption. 

Frontline used Jaspersoft to build standard domains for each work stream, validated by customers and supported with training and learning-center content. Now, users start with a customizable dataset rather than a blank page. They can then choose the fields they need, add filters, and move gradually to more advanced reporting capabilities. 

“The pre-built datasets give districts a clear starting point. Users can choose the information they need and organize it in a way that makes sense for their district, building confidence as they go.”

Self-service reporting gives districts more control

Reporting requirements can change quickly. District leaders may want vacancy numbers for an upcoming board meeting or be investigating a specific budget issue. Self-service tools give districts more flexibility to respond to these requests independently and on their own timelines.

Jaspersoft lets customers start with Frontline's existing domains and then modify their reports themselves. Nontechnical users can drag and drop fields, add filters, adjust outputs, and master more advanced reporting as their skills grow. Frontline still coaches users as needed, but customers keep control of their reports. 

"By leveraging Jaspersoft, we've given districts the power and autonomy to manage their own reporting. They can change what they need or dive deeper into the data without having to rely on our team for every request."

Dashboards make important information easier to act on

District leaders often need answers fast. Just having data isn't enough if users have to spend time pulling reports, filtering spreadsheets, and searching for needed information. 

For instance, leaders may need to quickly identify if a district has several staffing vacancies in one role or location to refocus recruiting efforts. Similarly, finance teams need up-to-date reports to monitor budgets, spending, and unexpected changes. 

With Jaspersoft's help, districts can build dashboards that surface the most relevant data as soon as users log in. Districts can then drill into the numbers behind the dashboard when they need more detail or create different views for distinct audiences, such as district-wide or school-level views. 

"Having that dashboard right as they log in is a very valuable tool. They can immediately see where they need to focus, and if they need more detail, they can drill down into the data behind it."

Connected data reduces spreadsheet work and duplicate entry

Districts need to trust that the information used for reporting, payroll, HR, and other workflows stays consistent, which can be challenging when data sits across multiple tables, workflows, and systems. Without a reporting layer, users may have to maintain multiple spreadsheets, manually join information, and double-enter data. This takes time and increases the risk of errors. 

With Jaspersoft, Frontline now brings different datasets together into a single reporting domain. For example, the tool can combine school employee and location information without requiring separate spreadsheets. Jaspersoft also exports information when other systems need it, such as sending newly hired employee information from position management to payroll without requiring manual reentry. 

"A lot of districts have spreadsheets on spreadsheets of data they're trying to combine. With Jaspersoft, we can bring different datasets into one place, keep systems in sync, and reduce the need to enter the same information more than once."

The Results

Reporting turns into a tool districts can use independently and a reason why Frontline’s users return to the product

Working with Jaspersoft, Frontline has seen a clear change in the way customers engage with reporting. With fewer support requests, Frontline's team can respond to deeper use case issues faster, often resolving them in a single phone call.

In addition, customers frequently return to the broader Frontline product for its reporting capabilities. Frontline’s reporting experience, supported by Jaspersoft, helps districts turn their ERP data into dashboards and reports that inform staffing, finance, payroll, and operational decisions.

Some dashboards even appear directly inside Frontline when users log in, making reporting part of the ongoing product experience. 

Experienced Frontline users now teach other districts how to build and use reports. Customers can learn from one another and build on reports that already work elsewhere. 

Carlene further credits the deeper analytics use with customer value and retention. Jaspersoft has helped make Frontline an invaluable, everyday tool for the school districts it serves.

“The value comes from helping districts put their data to work. When leaders can get the information they need to make informed decisions and manage day-to-day operations, we’re helping them use their time and resources more effectively.”