Depends on your state's threshold for supplies and equipment, your board's policy, and whether this is a new purchase or an option under a contract you already competed. Whether software counts toward that threshold is genuinely ambiguous in some states. We'll tell you what the record shows, not that you're exposed, to make a sale.

Yes, and it matters when the board votes in public. Vendors quote one bundled number; a board packet needs licenses, implementation, training, support and warranty on separate lines. We get that from the vendor in writing.

Usually rostering and integration with the systems you already run, migrating student and finance history, and training past the included hours. Those get priced after you've committed, often over the summer. We ask for them in writing up front and name implementation as the vendor's scope in the agreement.

The license price was competed once, by someone else, often a district with very different enrollment. Implementation, data migration and annual support usually weren't, and that's where the first-year number moves.

Usually. A first quote often carries modules you won't use until year two or three, and deferred scope isn't accruing escalators. We'll tell you which pieces can wait and price the smaller version, which matters more when the money is one-time.

Yes, from public records, with the source document attached. District contracts and board minutes are public, so you can verify any of it yourself. We don't name an agency in anything we publish without their written sign-off.