The NSI system can be accessed by authorised people from approved organisations:

• ECE Services
• ENROL support staff
• NZQA
• Tertiary Education Organisations (e.g. Universities, Private Training Organisations)
• Tertiary Education Commission (TEC)
• Ministry of Education support staff
• Organisations that use the Adult Literacy & Numeracy Assessment Tool (e.g Mitre 10 Mega, Griffins Food Ltd, & Z Energy Ltd).

Organisations may wish to access the NSI through a chosen Student Management System (SMS). Individual SMS applications will integrate with the NSI through the REST and/or BATCH interfaces.

The NSI system can be accessed in any of three different ways. The following three methods are all offered so that you can choose the combination best suited to your organisation.

Web interface

A web interface for users to login to and perform functions over the Internet. This option is essentially an NSI application that offers all the necessary functionality an organisation will need from the NSI system. All users must have their own individual Education Sector Logon (ESL) username and password to log in to the NSI web interface.

The NSI web interface is not designed to be integrated with an SMS.

The NSI application has been upgraded to .Net v4.6.

REST interface

The REST interface allows SMS systems to integrate with NSI data and functionality, over a standardised protocol. This allows the maintenance of your student records to remain in your SMS software, while sending and retrieving data from NSI in the background.

Integration with the REST interface requires custom development.

Batch file interface

A batch file interface is available to allow organisations to submit requests for NSI searches, additions, updates, and merges and the creation/updating of student relationships. Depending on the SMS implementation, as actions are carried out on the SMS, batch files may accumulate an organisation’s requests for searches, additions, updates, and merge requests and the creation/updating of student relationships for the NSI system to perform.

The batch file is sent by the organisation to the NSI system for processing by the NSI system. For each batch file processed by the NSI, a result file is generated that
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reports the outcome of batch file processing. This result file will be available for organisations to download and will then need to be loaded into the SMS.

For more information on accessing the NSI via a Student Management System please refer to the Guide to Integrating the National Student Index (GINS) document. A copy of this document can be requested from the Ministry of Education Service Desk (service.desk@education.govt.nz).

NSI Roles