Managing school rosters can be a tedious, time intensive process, made even more difficult when you have to manage multiple educational programs separately. This is where Clever comes in.

Clever is a third-party service used by school districts to facilitate the secure transfer of student rosters between their school information system (SIS) and digital learning applications. Districts maintain complete control over their data, including what they send to Clever and how it is shared. Applications will only receive the data they need, nothing more. Clever only syncs roster data—no grades, attendance, health records, etc.—so you don't have to worry about the wrong information getting in the wrong hands. It's even FERPA compliant!

Our partnership with Clever can help you maintain consistent, up-to-date patron records by automatically syncing (importing) your school's teacher and student rosters to Alexandria on a daily basis. When a student moves from one school to another or changes are made to their school record, the updated information will be synced with your Alexandria patron records, eliminating data entry errors that can occur when you have to update student records in multiple applications.

If your district hasn't signed up for Clever yet, head on over to www.clever.com to learn more, or check out the Clever Help Center to get started.

How does it work?

Basically, your district data syncs with Clever, then Clever allows authorized applications to securely access the data you've specified. Changes made to your SIS will be synced with Clever, which will then be updated in your authorized applications.

Specifically, Alexandria will automatically check for any updates from Clever and then import those changes to your patron records during Daily Operations. You can also choose to manually initiate a full sync from your Alexandria account at any time in Preferences > Extras > Clever.

Data imported from Clever to Alexandria during a sync will overwrite matching patron data fields. If the imported data does not match an existing record, a new record will be made based on the imported data and Alexandria defaults.
 

How do I get started?

The first thing is to sync data from your district's SIS with Clever, which is the foundation for everything Clever does. If your district is already set up on Clever then this should already be done. Follow these steps to add Alexandria to Clever:

1. Contact COMPanion to enable support for Clever integration.
2. Add Alexandria to your Clever dashboard.
3. Locate your Clever District ID.
4. Enable Clever in Alexandria.

And that's it! Alexandria will accept the request to receive data from Clever and begin automatically syncing roster information during Daily Operations.

Data Matching and Field Mapping

During the sync, Clever data is associated with Alexandria patrons by matching one or more key identifiers, including GUID, Student #, and Email. Blank fields are never used for matching.

Not all fields in your SIS are applicable to Alexandria, so not all student roster fields will be synced. Here's a list of the fields in Alexandria and the corresponding field in Clever that are matched during import:

Modify Student Field Mappings

Field mapping is automatically configured to match and overwrite fields in Alexandria with fields in Clever, as documented above. By default, Alexandria's Community ID and Barcode fields are not mapped with Clever. If you use these fields to identify patrons between systems, click Modify field mapping to customize how they're mapped with Clever.  

We will not attempt to match these fields unless you map them here.

Frequently Asked Questions

What happens to a patron record in Alexandria when the student is removed from our school roster?

If a student record is deleted from your SIS, the patron record in Alexandria will be marked as Transferred. Your librarian can delete or update those records manually as needed or during end-of-year procedures.

Who do I contact for Clever technical support?

If you can't find an answer in Clever's Help Center, fill out this form and a Clever support member will get back to you.

Locate Your Clever District ID

1. Click Sign In to Clever.
2. Log in with your Clever username and password.
3. On the main window, go to the Settings tab.
4. Go to the Instant Login Link under Application Information. Your District ID is at the end of this URL. Click Copy.
5. Go back to Clever in Alexandria, and then paste the District ID or complete URL into the District ID field.

1. District ID

Enter your Clever District ID or complete login URL here, then click Save.

2. Site Mapping

Your sites must be mapped to sync with Clever. Select a site from the Alexandria list on the left, then select the matching site from the Clever list on the right, and then click Match. Repeat this process with all of your sites. If a site has been matched incorrectly, select the site and click the red X to clear the current match.

When you're done matching your sites, click OK to close the window, then click Save.

3. Enable Clever

Click the toggle to enable Clever, then click Save.

This option is not available until a Clever District ID has been saved and your sites have been mapped.

4. Alert

Clever and SIF cannot be enabled at the same time: When you select Begin, Alexandria will disable SIF and clear all Patron SIF related identifiers. The Clever system and identifiers will then be initialized. If you have been using SIF with Alexandria, select Cancel and call COMPanion's Customer Support team for help.

To proceed, click Begin.

5. Automatically Update During Daily Operations

Select if you want Student, Teacher, and/or Admin (Staff) data to be synced and updated during Daily Operations.

6. Modify Student Field Mapping (Optional)

Field mapping is automatically configured to match and overwrite fields in Alexandria with fields in Clever, as documented above. By default, Alexandria's Community ID and Barcode fields are not mapped with Clever. If you use these fields to identify patrons between systems, click Modify field mapping to customize how they're mapped with Clever.  

We will not attempt to match these fields unless you map them here.

7. Sync Now

Save your changes, then click Sync Now.

8. Utility Queued

A dialog will pop up: The Clever Sync Utility has been queued. See Operations Management for details.

Click on the Operations Management link, select the Clever Full Sync operation, and then click to view and download the log.

Add Alexandria to Clever

1. Sign in to Clever

Under the Clever District ID field, click Sign In to Clever, then log in with your Clever username and password.

2. Request the Alexandria application

    In the sidebar, go to Applications > Add Applications, and then search for Alexandria.

• Have you already purchased Alexandria for use in your district? Yes
• Would you like to request a launch date for this application? No Custom Launch Date
• Click Request Application.

3. Request sent

    On the next screen, click Share data.

4. Choose a sharing type

    Select Share by District.

4. Sharing by District

    Check the box to share all district students and classes with Alexandria.

4. Save Changes