We're a growing coalition of school districts and edtech vendors committing to free, open, standards-based exchange of core student data — starting with OneRoster and expanding from there.
Districts already own their student information. But many edtech vendors — including student information systems (SIS) and rostering intermediaries — charge other vendors significant fees just to access data the district has already agreed to share. Some of it is dressed up as "integration" or "rostering" services. Functionally, it's a toll on interoperability.
These fees don't make data safer. They don't make it more accurate. They add a hidden cost to every product a district buys, they slow down onboarding, and they push smaller and newer vendors out of the market — which narrows the choices available to teachers, students, and families.
The result is a less competitive, less innovative, and more expensive K-12 technology ecosystem than the one open standards were built to create.
"Rostering data fees [were] ballooning well into six figures and trending toward seven... The result was an out of control rostering bill and a tax on our growth and time... Clever offered districts free single sign-on dashboards in exchange for access to their rostering data, which it wrapped in a proprietary data model and charged edtech vendors for access. ClassLink inverted this... charging districts for tools while giving edtech vendors free access to data through the open OneRoster standard."— Mick Hewitt, co-founder & CEO, Ednition (formerly co-founder, MasteryConnect), Edtech Insiders, Oct. 2025
By endorsing the K12 Data Exchange Initiative, a school district, education agency, or edtech vendor commits to the following principles.
Student, staff, and operational data originating from a school district belongs to that district. No vendor relationship changes that ownership, and no vendor should require payment from a third party to release it back to the district's own ecosystem.
Once a district has authorized the exchange of its data between two systems it uses, no vendor — SIS, rostering intermediary, or platform — will charge another vendor a fee to access, sync, or transmit that data.
Data exchange will use well-defined, publicly available standards — starting with 1EdTech's OneRoster — rather than proprietary schemas designed to lock districts or vendors into a single ecosystem.
Vendors that hold district data will provide reasonable, secure, standards-based access (REST/API and CSV, per OneRoster) so districts can choose the integration method that fits their infrastructure.
Open access does not mean unrestricted access. Signatories will continue to meet FERPA and applicable state student-data-privacy requirements and support vetted, authenticated, least-privilege data sharing.
Signatories support extending free, standards-based exchange beyond OneRoster's current core to the adjacent data domains outlined below, as standards mature to cover them.
Today, the initiative is anchored to data already defined by 1EdTech's OneRoster standard — rostering, enrollments, and gradebook/assessment results. We intend to expand it to closely adjacent data districts rely on every day.
Students, teachers, courses, classes, organizations, and enrollment relationships — OneRoster's core Rostering service.
Grades, line items, score scales, and assessment results — OneRoster's Gradebook service and Assessment Results Profile.
Parent/guardian identity and relationship records needed for communication, safety, and family engagement tools.
Daily and period attendance, absence codes, and related records that power hall pass, safety, and operations tools.
Free, standards-based exchange isn't just cheaper. It changes what's possible for the people actually running and attending a school.
A more complete, consistent picture of each student across tools, instead of gaps caused by systems that can't (or won't) talk to each other.
Less time re-entering data by hand across platforms, and more confidence that the data in front of them is current and accurate.
Lower total cost of ownership, faster onboarding of new tools, and the freedom to choose best-in-class products instead of being locked to one ecosystem.
A level playing field where products compete on quality and outcomes — not on who can afford the biggest data-access fees.
This initiative doesn't invent new technology. It asks the industry to actually live up to the open-exchange standards that already exist and that districts are already paying to support through membership and procurement.
OneRoster "solves a school's need to securely and reliably exchange roster information, course materials, and grades between systems," supporting both CSV and real-time REST exchange, so "onboarding new systems is a breeze."
1edtech.org/standards/oneroster →1EdTech positions open standards as the foundation of a "trusted digital learning ecosystem," and runs the TrustEd Apps™ program specifically so open data exchange and student-data privacy can advance together, not in conflict.
1edtech.org/standards/data-privacy →A nonprofit, Dell Foundation-backed alliance whose data standard and API are free to use: membership is free, and "access to Ed-Fi technology is permitted by signing a free license agreement," with adoption across 250+ vendors, 32 state agencies, and nearly 12,000 districts.
ed-fi.org/ed-fi-data-standard →A4L's mission is "to unite education stakeholders in developing open, learner-centered data standards, tools, and best practices that ensure trust, confidence and reliability through seamless connectivity, privacy, and security" — free and community-governed since 1997.
a4l.org/about-us →The Consortium for School Networking provides districts a free toolkit specifically because most K-12 tools "aren't interoperable," forcing staff to manually stitch data together across systems — the exact friction open exchange is meant to remove.
cosn.org/tools-resources/toolkits/interoperability →A first-hand account from an edtech founder describing rostering fees that "ballooned well into six figures and trending toward seven," and one major vendor that "wrapped [rostering data] in a proprietary data model and charged edtech vendors for access."
edtechinsiders.substack.com →The K12 Data Exchange Initiative is an independent, vendor- and district-led pledge. It is not operated, endorsed, or sponsored by 1EdTech, Ed-Fi Alliance, A4L Community, or CoSN. Their materials are cited here because they define the open standards this pledge asks the industry to actually honor in practice — including on pricing, not just technical capability.
Open to any school district, education agency, or edtech vendor that supports free, standards-based student data exchange. This list grows as organizations sign on below.
Endorsing takes about two minutes. We'll list your organization above and follow up with ways to help spread the initiative.
No. Vendors can charge districts whatever the market supports for their software and services. This pledge is specifically about not charging other vendors a fee to access data a district already owns and has authorized for exchange.
No. Open standards like OneRoster define secure, authenticated exchange methods. Signatories commit to continuing to meet FERPA and state privacy requirements alongside open access — the two are not in conflict.
Any school district, charter network, education service agency, state education agency, or edtech vendor that supports the principles above. Individuals who work in K-12 education or edtech are welcome to add their voice as a supporter as well.
Your organization is added to the public endorsers list, and you'll receive updates on how the initiative is progressing and how to help bring other organizations on board.