Purge or Retain Data

The process of preparing your data for import to HMH Import Management varies depending on your organization's decision to purge data or retain existing data.

Note: In the past, many districts purged their data each year in order to start the new school year clean. However, HMH no longer recommends purging to clean up your data every year. See the Purging Data section below for HMH recommendations.

Purging Data

HMH recommends that you retain data whenever possible. See the following table to determine whether your district should purge, retain, or use an alternative option to meet your data needs.

Condition	Recommended Action
You want to clear out the existing data, and you used the Simple File Format (SFF) template last year.	DO NOT purge. Mass inactivate your existing data by uploading the users.csv, class.csv, and classassignments.csv files with just the header rows for your first run.
Last year, you used Traditional import templates (ThinkCentral or Holt McDougal Online) for rostering, and this year, you want to move to SFF.	DO NOT purge. Use the account linking option. See Account Linking Using Simple File Format for details.
Last year, you used the Simple File Format (SFF) template or one of the Traditional import templates (ThinkCentral or Holt McDougal Online) for rostering, and this year, you want to move to OneRoster.	DO NOT purge. You must first perform a mass inactivation of your accounts in the previous template format. ● For SFF, populate just the header rows of the users.csv, class.csv, and classassignments.csv files and then upload. ● For TC, enter a "D" in the Active/Inactive (column R) for all data in the import file and then upload. ● For HMO, enter an "I" in the Activate field (column Q) for all data in the users.csv file and then upload.
You want to clear out the existing data, and you plan to use Traditional import templates (ThinkCentral or Holt McDougal Online) for rostering this year.	DO NOT purge. Inactivate your existing data by using the appropriate column in the import file to inactivate data. ● For TC template users, enter a "D" in the Active/Inactive field (column R) for all data in the import file and then upload. ● For HMO template users, enter an "I" in the Activate field (column Q) for all data in the users.csv file and then upload.
You have duplicate data (manual entry mistakes).	Request a data purge. See the Request a Data Purge section below for details. You may want to export or print reports from the previous year before proceeding with the purge request. See ThinkCentral Admin Help: Create District Reports topic or Holt McDougal Teacher Help: About Class Reports topic for details.
You are changing your users' LASIDs and usernames.

Request a Data Purge

If your organization wants to purge their existing data, you must prepare and submit a purge request form, which requires you to specify the extent of the data purge. While HMH performs the actual purge, we use the information on the form to ensure that only data specifically included in the request is purged.

Note: In order to avoid confusion and errors, HMH recommends that districts assign the purge process to a single district administrator account to lead the effort and communicate to all school administrators.

To request a data purge:

1. Download the HMH Data Purge Request Form (PDF). (Click link to download form.)

2. Complete the Data Purge Request Form, and note the following:

– If you connect to TC or HMO through a portal, secure content key (SCK), then you must include that information on the form.

– Be sure not to remove your own account.

– The Data Purge Request Form allows you to specify the data to be purged, as detailed in the following table.

Data Type	Decision	Notes
User Accounts – Administrators, Teachers, Classes, and/or Students	You may select any or all of these user accounts to be purged.	Purging student accounts deletes all data associated with the students. Purging teacher accounts deletes the teacher and the teacher's class data.
Grade Levels	You may select any or all grade levels to be purged.	Most districts that purge select all grade levels.
School Name	You may select any or all schools in your district to be purged.	The school names you want to purge must be listed as the name occurs in ThinkCentral and/or Holt McDougal Online, including the HMH PID (MDR) associated with each school. (See Locate MDR PIDs for instructions.)

3. Submit the completed Data Purge Request Form to HMH Support. When the purge is completed, HMH Support contacts you.

Note: In most cases, your purge request is completed within two full business days upon receipt of the request form. However, depending on the volume of requests, times can vary. For HMO users who choose not to include the school year as part of the classnames, a purge can take up to 14 days.

You are now ready to populate your data import files.

Retaining Data

Instructions for retaining data differ for each template type available as detailed below.

Simple File Format (SFF) Template (recommended template)

If you are retaining users (students and teachers) and their corresponding data and using the SFF templates, then you can implement account linking. See Account Linking Using Simple File Format for details.

Traditional ThinkCentral Template

To retain data using the TC template: (Click to view details.)

Traditional Holt McDougal Online Template

To retain data using the HMO template: (Click to view details.)