The Arkansas Public School Computer Network (APSCN) plans to officially release Cycle 1 for state reporting on Tuesday, August 1, 2006. On or before that date the documentation and required forms for completing state reporting for Cycle 1 will be placed on the APSCN website at http://www.k12.ar.us/apscndocs/sis.htm, under the heading “Current Cycle.”
Districts are requested to make certain that all reports are printed and verified before submission. The deadline for submitting Cycle 1 is September 15, 2006. Prior to submission the budget must be approved by the board of directors at a legally held meeting.
Districts must print the Cycle 1 Annual Financial Report and Budget (AFRB) SIGNATURE PAGE from the APSCN website, have the School Board President and the Ex Officio Financial Secretary sign the form and mail the AFRB SIGNATURE PAGE to the address on the form. Districts must also print the Cycle 1 CERTIFICATION OF ACCURACY FORM from the APSCN website, have the form signed by the superintendent, and mail the form to the address indicated on the form.
Cycle 1 includes 2005-2006 Actual Revenue and Expenditures and 2006-2007 Budgeted Revenue and Expenditures. According to Arkansas Code Annotated Section 6-20-2202 (as amended by Act 730 of 2005) the ex officio financial secretary of a school district, open-enrollment charter school, or education cooperative and the individual's surety shall be liable for any warrants or checks countersigned after September 15th if a budget has not been filed. In addition, state grants and aids shall be suspended if the reporting requirements of Arkansas Code Annotated Section 6-20-2202 (as amended by Act 730 of 2005) have not been met by September 15th. Accurately completing and submitting Cycle 1 and mailing the required signature forms by September 15th will ensure compliance with Arkansas Code Annotated Section 6-20-2202 (as amended by Act 730 of 2005).
The Arkansas Department of Education (ADE) has discovered that districts, educational cooperatives, and open-enrollment charter schools sometimes enter transactions affecting the previous year's actual revenue and/or expenditures after having submitted Cycle 1. Normally these are journal entries posted in period 13 of the previous fiscal year. This causes a difference to occur between the information reported to the state and the information residing in the local database. Cycle 1 should report the actual and final revenue and expenditures from the previous school year. If Cycle 1 has been submitted and, because of a material error or omission, it becomes necessary to post an additional journal entry affecting the previous year's financial data, it will be necessary to re-submit Cycle 1. The re-submission is the only way the correction can be reflected in the unit record in the state data warehouse. However, re-submissions cannot be approved indefinitely since the state must define a point in time where the data is no longer subject to change and can be relied upon for official reports. For this year a final close must be done no later than November 30th. Re-submissions of Cycle 1 will not be allowed after November 30th, 2006.
Any district experiencing problems entering or submitting data should contact the Department of Information Systems (DIS) Help Desk at 800-435-7989. Please request that the trouble ticket be assigned to the Statewide Information System (SIS) Group.