SASI Dump to Access and Excel

By Tony Mitchell, Jana Reese, and Wes Drury

Purpose of this process:

• This process may be useful for manipulating and transferring data from one data-file to another
• Most of the data needed for various student accessed programs is already available in SASI; however, unless you can move it, or copy and paste it, knowing this fact does not help you
• Generally, if the data can be moved into Microsoft Excel or Access, it can then be exported into other programs, such as Accelerated Reader or Follet
• One of my schools is inputting emergency data into SASI and exporting to Access. Then they are printing out the Access document for each teacher and having parents check and correct the data (in red ink) during registration rather than having parents fill out several information cards Of course the corrections and addition will have to be entered into SASI
• Below are the step for moving student data from SASI into Microsoft Access and Excel

Exporting data from SASI

• Go to SASI query (in utilities module)
• From the top left display dropdown menu, choose Export
• Put a space behind the ASTU in the top title box
• Below, in the ASTU column, double click each of the fields you want
• Your need here will be determined by the needs of the program to which you are moving this data
• To get the Teacher Name into a field you must click on “Advisor” in the left-hand column 1 and drag it to the blank box just above column 2 (not the box with the dropdown menu, the one just above it)
• Click on the export button (bottom right)
• Leave all defaults in first dialogue box
• Click OK
• You must choose .TXT from the “Save as type” dropdown menu
• If you are not given choices in from this dropdown menu simply add .txt to your file name
• Example: SASIExport.txt
• Title the file with an appropriate descriptive name (include the word Export in the name) and save it to the desktop (or to some place you can access it to import it)

Importing the data into Access

• Launch Access
• Select a blank database (it is an option in the task-pane)
• Name it SASI import (or whatever you want) and click Create
• Go to File menu and choose Get External Data and Import
• In the “Files of Type” box at the bottom of the Import window, scroll to and select “Text Files”
• Navigate to the .txt file you saved in the steps above and click Import
• Follow all defaults EXCEPT do not select a Primary Key
• There are four windows that cover various options such as delimited, tab, in new table, and fields; the first 4 are correct; you may choose finish at the fourth window, but if you go to the Primary key window, change the default to “No Primary Key” and click next or finish. Either one will finish the import
• In the fourth window
• It will save the Table to your desktop or document folder; double click on the table (not the database) to open it
• Remember that some of the information in SASI is confidential and should be treated such

Importing data into Excel rather than Access

• Launch Excel
• Under the Data menu choose Import External Data / then Import Data
• Navigate to the .txt file you created and save to the desktop in the steps above
• In the File Type, scroll to Text Files
• Accept all of the defaults (steps 1,2,3) and click Finish
• It will open in the exiting workbook
• Name and save your newly created Excel file
• Remember that some of the information in SASI is confidential and should be treated such