The Ultimate Nonprofit SharePoint App: The Case Management Database of Children's Network of Solano County

At TechSoup, we’re always interested in how nonprofits cleverly solve IT problems. Getting a case management databases in use by several people and across different offices and even across different organizations is a particularly thorny problem. Thanks to Darren DeRose, the IT Administrator for Children's Network of Solano County in Fairfield, California, having a shared database is no longer such a problem.

The Children’s Network of Solano County does lots of things to support low-income families across their county. It secures funding for children’s services and programs, influences policy at the local and state level, helps families get services, and collects and publishes data on the health, safety and well-being of Solano County children.

The Children’s Network also convenes and coordinates other local child welfare agencies, knitting together seven family resource centers with a database called the Childnet Results Manager data system. Darren reports that this was made possible through the Microsoft software and licenses donated through TechSoup.

Here’s what I asked Darren:

Why you decided to build a case management database in SharePoint?

This project actually started with a Microsoft Access version of the Childnet Results Manager. Our new SharePoint web-based version how many organizations we can serve. It integrates United Way of the Bay Area's SparkPoint Centers in Solano with the Family Resource Centers data system across all of Solano County. We decided to upgrade the Childnet Results Manager from a local area network based system using Microsoft Access to a web-based system using Microsoft SharePoint 2010, backed with Microsoft SQL Server 2008 on Windows Server 2008.

We chose SharePoint primarily because of its tremendous flexibility and its integration with Microsoft Office products. This enables all of our users to collaborate county-wide and allows seamless sharing of data (documents, calendaring, events, tasks, internal client referrals, and discussion forums). The database system also maintains security and confidentiality of clients. The system enables us to have SSL, 128-bit encryption, security groups, and several levels of user permissions. SharePoint also enables versioning and item retention, so users cannot accidentally delete or overwrite any documents or list items.

What does the database do and how do people in the organizations you serve use it?

It is an outcome-based case management information and referral database. Users enter and maintain information about clients, which we call demographics, case notes, assessments, applications, workshops and events, and referrals. Workflows are triggered automatically to help ensure outcomes are tracked and logged. In addition to the standard case management features, users can share documents, calendars, tasks, participate in discussion forums, and create site-wide surveys. Right now, the SparkPoint Centers in Solano are currently using it. We are in the process of adding additional family resource center organization to this system.

Can you say a bit about your process for designing and building the database?

I used SharePoint Designer 2010 and made use of SharePoint’s internal templates. I met with our SparkPoint staff to gather all of their forms and then matched them with the Access version of the Childnet Results Manager to find common fields and features and went from there. Most of the work was adding new fields, designing custom forms, and configuring SQL Server 2008 reporting integration. Once I have finished adding the additional family resource center organization, I can save the entire site as a template that can be used in any SharePoint environment.

Microsoft SharePoint servers and client access licenses are available at TechSoup.