Table of Contents:

1. KFS 3.0 and Rice 1.0.1 Now Available to Download!
2. Opportunity to join HR/Payroll Project Initiative
3. New kuali.org website and Subscription Channel service
4. Kuali Endowment Module coming soon
5. Kuali Welcomes Two New Members
6. Upcoming Kuali Projects
7. Kuali Days VIII just days away!

The Kuali Foundation has released the Kuali Financial System (KFS) 3.0 and Kuali Rice 1.0.1. These releases represent the culmination of many years of collaborative work among higher education institutions to build a financial system that meets their collective needs.

Five years ago, a community of higher education institutions frustrated by the high licensing and support costs, poor functional fit, forced upgrades, and difficult integration challenges of vended enterprise resource planning (ERP) software, decided to combine their resources to build an enterprise financial system for higher education by higher education. Assisted by a $2.5M grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, partners from a variety of schools and organizations worked together to deliver robust enterprise financial system software enabling higher education institutions to implement best practices and sound accounting practices at an affordable cost.

KFS 3.0 includes the addition of the following modules

• Accounts Receivable
• Capital Asset Management
• Effort Certification
• Budget Construction

These new modules, along with enhancements to the previously released Chart of Accounts, General Ledger, Financial Transactions, Purchasing, Accounts Payable, Labor Distribution, and Contracts and Grants modules, provide all of the functionality of Indiana University’s Financial Information System (on which KFS’s functionality is based), and many valuable enhancements. KFS 3.0 is a complete enterprise financial system that meets the needs of all Carnegie class institutions, no matter how large or small.

KFS has already been successfully implemented at Colorado State University, San Joaquin Delta College, and the Naval Postgraduate School at significantly lower cost than an average ERP implementation. Indiana University is currently running the KFS 3.0 General Ledger and Labor Ledger processes. In addition, there is a growing community of support around the project including a team of sustaining partners that will allow for continuous improvements and upgrades to the system.

Out of the development of KFS and other Kuali initiatives, Kuali Rice has emerged. Kuali Rice consists of a set of modules comprising a middleware stack that provides essential services to every Kuali application. Beyond the Kuali applications, Rice is becoming a preferred choice for institutions establishing a common enterprise architecture. Rice improves enterprise application development speed, consistency, and maintainability well beyond the Kuali applications.

The completion of five years of work on KFS 3.0 and Kuali Rice 1.0.1 demonstrates what is possible when higher education institutions work together. In times where institutional resources are severely constrained, sharing resources on a collaborative project allows much more to be accomplished. .

KFS 3.0 and Kuali Rice 1.0.1 are available as free downloads at kuali.org. The source code and all project functional and technical documentation, including release notes and installation guide, are readily available. Visitors to kuali.org are also invited to take a test drive and provide feedback.

Over the past year, many schools have expressed interest in the idea of forming a Kuali HR/Payroll project. Many of us have aging HR/Payroll systems and are looking for a comprehensive, fully functional system, that is built BY higher education FOR higher education. The interested schools have prepared a document to describe the objectives of the project, and an initial phase for delivery; this document can be found at: https://kuali.org/system/files/HR-pre-project-plan-Nov-2009.pdf

As with all Kuali initiatives, the way these projects get started is for interested institutions and/or commercial affiliates to come together and collaborate; those institutions that are partners and provide resources will oversee the design, development and priorities of the project.

This is an opportunity for other schools to become involved in this project as partners. We are meeting at Kuali Days VIII in San Antonio to discuss potential involvement and start-up of this project. That meeting is Wednesday 11/18 from 2:00-5:00pm local time in Conf Room 12. If you think you might have interest in this project please join us. Or, if you want to find out more and are unable to attend, please contact Jennifer Foutty at jfoutty@kuali.org.

Recently, we implemented an upgrade to our www.kuali.org web site. Not only is the navigation updated to be more usable, and the content enhanced with more comprehensive information, but we have new tools and techniques for users to be become involved and to follow Kuali activities. Please see this post if you would like to read more about the new website.

Along with the website, Kuali rolled out a new Subscription Channel service that allows you to easily follow Kuali news and other communications. If you were previously signed up to receive Kuali's Newsletter, you have been automatically subscribed to the Kuali News Channel (we will no longer use our listserv to distribute the Newsletter). We recommend that people who are involved in Kuali sign up for the Kuali Insider Channel, which includes the same information from the News channel and much more. You can easily opt-out of any channel at any time following the instructions at the bottom of every email you receive from that channel.

Most of you know that the KFS release 3.0 has been delivered to partners, with the final year-end processing modules coming this month. But, there is an important module that will be released next year: the Kuali Endowment Module (KEM).

Endowment funds (and similarly invested long-term funds) and their corresponding investments are key components of the financial structure of most colleges and universities. The KEM system will deliver a means to account for investments, investment transactions, obligations, and the underlying funds to which those assets and liabilities belong. The KEM system will be based on the functionality of the IU Foundation Endowment and Trust Accounting (ETA) System, andis being re-engineered adhering to the Kuali Architecture and Standards. The application includes:

• Investment tracking and reporting
• Investment participation (endowment and non-endowment) management and reporting including unitized transaction
• Budgeted and actual income projections (pooled funds and separately invested holdings)
• Access to donor instructions
• Manage available funds with searchable data elements describing the terms of us
• Beneficiary disbursement process and information (tax) reporting

Look for more info on KEM! And, if you would like to join as a partner, please contact Jennifer Foutty at jfoutty@kuali.org.

We extend a warm welcome to the newest members of the Kuali Community, Rimini Street (commercial affiliate) and North West University in South Africa.

Be looking for announcements soon about new Kuali projects. At Kuali Days VIII, there will be an announcement about at least one new project.

The community is looking forward to seeing all of our colleagues at Kuali Days VIII on November 17 and 18, 2009, in San Antonio, Texas. The full Kuali Days Schedule is now available online here: http://kuali.org/files/schedule/schedule.xml

Be sure to check out the schedule on your smart phone, and remember to use the tag #kd8 for tweeting about Kuali Days VIII.

Registration is still open at www.kuali.org/kd so please register and join us in San Antonio!