How Madison Metropolitan School District Used Logikcull to Eliminate a Multi- Year Public Records Request Backlog

About the Madison Metropolitan School District

The Madison Metropolitan School District (MMSD) is the second largest school district in Wisconsin and serves over 25,000 students in 52 schools. The District covers approximately 74 square miles including all or part of the cities of Madison and Fitchburg, the villages of Maple Bluff and Shorewood Hills, and the towns of Blooming Grove, Burke and Madison.

Problem Statement

The MMSD needed to address the multi-year backlog of public records requests for the District. There were several significant challenges the team had to overcome in order to catch up and stay ahead of these types of requests while not falling behind on current requests.

Key Challenges

• Departure of the Legal Services’ Clerk in charge of public records.
• Heavy, date-driven workloads for remaining staff.
• Incoming public record requests rotated amongst remaining staff.
• Lack of a clear view of status of existing public records requests.
• An incomplete tracking log of public records requests.
• Working with legacy technology or hard copy of material for review and redaction.
• Time wasted on duplicate material within document review sets.
• Time and resources wasted on multiple prints and scans of responsive material.

How Challenges Were Addressed

The ability to drag-and-drop responsive documents in their native format into project folders where multiple automatic processes occurred resulted in significant time- saving results for the user. All duplicate documents were removed and all records were converted to searchable PDFs.

Because this automated process happened prior to the reviewer even accessing their review set, users could save time and focus on finding the legally protected information that needed to be redacted or withheld. The automated removal of duplicate documents also helped ensure that the appropriate documents were included in the responsive set. In addition, the need for paper copies of responsive material during the review phase was eliminated. This resulted in the reduction of office supply costs (paper, copier ink, staples, clips, folders, etc.) and copier damage.

In addition, users saved time by eliminating the need for the initial printed review. Redactions of the protected information were also done using the tool’s bulk redaction feature. Furthermore, the need to scan the redacted reviewed set was eliminated. Given these time-saving features, all that remained was simply the few seconds (to minutes on a large file) required to download the redacted responsive set and then respond to the requester with the redacted set via email or a printed copy for mailing.

The ROI Results of Using Logikcull

Document review is still a time-consuming process that can take from hours to months. However, running responsive documents within Logikcull has helped bring this user current on public records requests. In addition, it has also created efficiencies by removing duplicates and providing the option for multiple, simultaneous redactions, which is invaluable to the review process. For example, data access that initially took 48 hours to complete now averages about 30 minutes; and, production creation that generally took 24 hours is completed in one hour on average. Ultimately, for MMSD it all comes down to time savings, which enables staff to process records more quickly and efficiently.

• Eliminated Multi-Year Backlog
• Reduced Office Supply Costs
• Maximized Request Process Efficiency

Key Features used in Logikcull

• Very user-friendly with several review-centric automated features.
• Bulk actions, which exist throughout the user experience (bulk tag, bulk redaction, etc.).
• No need to convert everything to PDF prior to upload.
• Integration with multiple programs for data uploads.
• Uploaded material is searchable using multiple search criteria options.
• Linking of documents with similar content is a helpful document review feature.
• Ability to redact each instance of a keyword with the click of a button.
• Ability to limit select user access to upload only.
• Useful reporting capabilities.
• Excellent customer service, including quarterly account reviews with Logikcull.