Student Data

Generally speaking, an employee is considered a student if education is the predominate aspect of their relationship with the campus.  However, for CIRS reporting purposes, students are defined as non-represented employees in class codes below:

All other student related classifications Instructional Student Assistants (1150, 1151), Graduate Assistants (2325, 2326, 2355), and Teaching Associates (2353, 2354) are considered regular employees for CIRS reporting purposes. Refer to the employment data (AC, AN, TR) files and the payment data (PH, PY, PHS) files to locate information for these employees.

Here are some things to keep in mind when retrieving data for students (as defined for CIRS reporting purposes):

• Limited personal data (e.g., sex, ethnicity, address) for student employees can be found in the Student Assistant (ST) file.

• All payment data for student employees (e.g., position number, hours worked, salary rate) can be found in the payment data files (PH, PY, PHS). To identify student payments, use the data elements: Class Code (XX:CLASS), Payment Type (XX:PAYMETYP) and Payroll Status (XX:STATUS)

• The A98 transaction, also known as a Student Payroll Action Request (SPAR), is a 'shell' document used to establish a PIMS database record for the student employee and only contains a few data elements. For example, students appointed via the A98 transaction do not have data for the Noncitizen and Disability related fields.

• Students appointed via A98 transactions are entered into the PIMS database once, by the campus that initially hires the student. The transaction can only be viewed by systemwide CIRS users and the campus that keyed the transaction.

• Payments for student employees in class code 1870, 1871 or 1872 do not require a matching position on the PIMS database. Student employees paid in these class codes simply need to have a record on the PIMS database for pay to issue.

• If a campus has not processed an A98 transaction, the only position on the PIMS database might be for a civil service agency. For these employees, pay will issue for the campus position number entered on the payment transaction. Note: Civil service agency appointments are not available in CIRS.

• Separation transactions are not required for A98 transactions. So, students who are no longer working at your campus may appear in the ST file. To identify active student employees, refer to the payment files to identify those who were recently paid.

• Students work on a positive-pay basis. For example, if students work during the month of May, their pay is generally issued during the month of June. If you want to report on payments in the same month as they are issued, create a Payment Extract (PY) file for the current business month.

Last Updated: April 5, 2006