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The Ed-Fi Unifying Data Model is the widely adopted, CEDS-aligned, open-source data standard developed by the educational community for the betterment of the community. The Unifying Data Model captures the meaning and inherent structure of the most important information in the K–12 education enterprise.

The Ed-Fi Unifying Data Model, along with the normative and non-normative guidance in the Ed-Fi Standards, serve as the foundation for enabling interoperability among secure data systems.

Note

Please note that the current version of Data Standard v3.3 is v3.3.1-b, which contains early access content. Data Standard v3.3. is built on top on v3.2, so its elements are mostly consistent with v3.2. See the What's New page for information on the early access content.

Contents

Data Model Documentation

The data model is referred to as the Ed-Fi Unifying Data Model, or UDM. The UDM is documented via 2 primary artifacts: the Ed-Fi Data Handbook and a set of Unified Modeling Language (UML) diagrams.

Ed-Fi Data Handbook for v3.3.1-b

Ed-Fi UDM UML Diagrams for v3.3.1-b (Visio format, on GitHub)

Additional documentation is provided in the Ed-Fi Unifying Data Model section in this space. This additional documentation provides narrative overviews of domains and key entities, as well as normative best practice guidance.

Version

The most recent version and name for the Ed-Fi Data Standard is Ed-Fi Data Standard for Suite 3 v3.3.1-b.

This is an "early access" release, meaning it contains newer data model changes that have yet to be proven in field work. Organizations wishing to avoid such early material – which is naturally subject to change – are advised to stick to elements defined in the current release – see Ed-Fi Data Standard v3.2 for information on those elements.

For more information on the community development and governance process, please visit Standards Development Process.
For more information on data standard versioning, please consult: Ed-Fi Data Standard Versioning and Releases

REST API Bindings

Current REST API bindings are based on previous Data Standard releases. However, since this release is non-breaking, the current 3.3.0-a release is backwards-compatible with those bindings. The relevant RFC bindings can be found here:

Bulk / XML Bindings

In addition, a set of Bulk / XML standards (core entity XML definitions and interchange specifications) based on this release are available on GitHub.

Sample Data

The Data Standard includes sample data in the bulk XML format. The sample data is based on an entirely fictitious district called "Grand Bend ISD." Note that the sample data does not cover all model elements, and that while some effort is made to provide realistic data, the data is managed more to provide coverage of elements rather than realism.

Standard Descriptors

The Standard includes default "code sets" or "enumeration values" and their definitions. Descriptor values are published on GitHub in XML format.

Only descriptor values in the "ed-fi.org" namespace are part of the standard. In some contexts, the Alliance publishes values in the Grand Bend "gbisd.edu" namespace (Grand Bend the fictitious district for the sample data). This is done for descriptors whose actual values are nearly always locally defined, and therefore non-standardizable.

Data Exchange Standards

For a list of standards built on the Ed-Fi Unifying Data Model, visit the Ed-Fi Data Exchange Standards Home.

Guidelines

The Ed-Fi Alliance publishes technical guidelines for building solutions based on the Ed-Fi Data Standard:

For REST API design and implementation guidelines, visit the Ed-Fi API Design & Implementation Guidelines documentation.
For XSD design and implementation guidelines covering bulk XML, visit the Ed-Fi XSD Design & Implementation Guidelines (PDF) documentation.

Ed-Fi Data Standard v3.3