How Mid-East Career & Technology Centers Turned Paperwork Into Same-Day Results

Challenges Before Frontline	Results After Frontline
Paper-based contracts and payroll slowed every process. Manual packets and USPS delays meant HR staff chased signatures for weeks, retyped handwritten forms, and risked lost or incomplete records.	Same-day turnaround on contracts. Most new-hire packets and contracts are now signed and returned electronically the same day they’re sent.
Manual payroll data entry consumed full workdays. Staff spent 8–10 hours re-entering and verifying time sheets each month, with frequent handwriting errors.	5–7 hours saved per payroll run. Processing time dropped to about 2.5–3 hours, freeing hours every month for higher-value work.
Compliance tracking was inconsistent. Fraud-training completion and annual policy acknowledgments were managed outside HR systems, risking missed requirements. .	Audit-ready compliance visibility. Fraud-training completion is now trackable in Frontline, preventing pay errors and satisfying state audit checks.

A Career & Technology Center Across 13 Counties Goes Digital

Mid‑East CTC supports high school CTE programs — from power line to welding to carpentry — plus Adult Education and Aspire high‑school equivalency, with two campuses, covering roughly 13 counties, and just under 400 employees. The payroll department, an executive secretary who manages contracts and salary notices, and the superintendent’s secretary handling certifications shoulder much of the HR load. 

They weren’t new to Frontline. They already used Frontline to track absences and find substitutes, and years ago, the team adopted electronic timesheets. Assistant Treasurer Jodi Stapleton remembered, “We were the first school district in the state of Ohio to go live with electronic time sheets and being able to download them and import them into the state payroll software.” That history made adding Frontline Central feel like the next obvious step. 

What Wasn’t Working

Paper Bottlenecks. Before Central, HR lived in file folders and mail merges. Contracts, salary notices, and payroll paperwork were fully manual. “Previously we were doing everything on paper hard copies… It was a little bit of a challenge to get people to return things on a timely basis, whether contracts or straight payroll paperwork. It was a lot of chasing people down.” 

Part‑Time Staff Complexity. The inconsistency showed up the most with part‑time hires (about half the staff) because different secretaries owned different steps and processes varied by department. 

Compliance Pressure. Annual policy acknowledgments and required trainings lived outside the tools they already used, and Ohio’s fraud‑training requirement — mandatory for all new hires, as well as every four to five years for all staff — wasn’t tracked cleanly. Jodi recalled, “We are technically not supposed to pay someone who has not completed that fraud training. But we didn’t have a good way to track it before.” 

Manual Re‑Keying, Slow Mail. USPS delays dragged out contract cycles, and payroll staff struggled to decipher handwriting and type the data back in. Across miles of rural locations, paper got lost. The HR staff was overwhelmed by paperwork and tired of chasing signatures. 

Why They Stayed with the Suite That Already Worked

One Suite, Fewer Logins. When Jodi and the team encountered Frontline Central, the choice was all about continuity. Most staff were already in Frontline through Absence & Time, and they wanted a single, trackable place to send contracts, assemble new‑hire packets, gather acknowledgments, and see at a glance what was outstanding. “Because we were already using the other products from Frontline, it just made sense to go with Frontline.” 

Built for K‑12 HR. Central replaces paper with form workflows, routes items automatically, and updates employee records without re‑typing — giving time back to HR and consistent data across the suite. 

One Summer From Kickoff to Go‑Live — Mail Merges Out, Modern Workflows In

The project kicked off in spring with Frontline consultants. By July, the team was live, and they rolled out to staff on Opening Day in mid‑August. 

From Database + Word to Central. Contracts moved from a database and mail merges into Central, with the Frontline team building most initial forms. Straightforward forms were quick. Conditional logic, such as “If you answer this, go here,” benefited from hands‑on help beyond weekly sessions and videos. 

Start Hires Earlier. Jodi explained that the team built a ‘Recommendation for Employment’ e‑form that let secretaries begin the hiring process even if the candidate wasn’t yet in the system. The form sent data to a temporary placeholder record so HR could track progress until the hire was finalized, eliminating gaps in communication and delays. 

Designed for Real Life. Automated routing and reminders, end‑to‑end visibility, and a unified staff record sync across Absence, Time, and Professional Growth. 

The Results: Packets in Inboxes, Not in Mail Trays

Trackable Packets. “The biggest win is, when I can send out a new hire packet, it has all the forms in it, and I send it electronically — it goes through email,” Jodi said. “I can then track what forms they haven’t completed… and which ones they might have questions about.” 

Same‑Day Signatures. After the August board meeting, contracts went out electronically to all approved staff. Jodi said, “That was a huge win as well, because we could send them out and we weren’t waiting on the U.S. Mail.” Better yet: “Most sign them and send them back the same day we send them.”  

Compliance, Handled. The fraud‑training requirement moved into trackable workflows. HR could prevent paying a staff member before the mandate was met and quickly prove compliance during audits. 

Payroll Gets Hours Back Every Month

“Another win was with the time sheets with payroll and one not having to hand enter every person’s time sheet,” Jodi said. Before, the monthly “extra pay” payroll took eight to ten hours of manual entry. “Now I can do it in about two and a half to three hours.” A secondary payroll saves another three to four hours each month. Exceptions are easy to see, and the handwriting dilemma (“Is that a seven or a one?”) is gone. 

Auditors Like Clean Math

“Our state auditors were very happy that our coordinators put together a time sheet recap,” Jodi noted — a spreadsheet listing each person, hours, and rate. “They could pull that spreadsheet and then look at the monthly summary in Time & Attendance and verify that, ‘Yes, those are the hours… and those are the hours that you paid them for.’” 

What Changed — By the Numbers and in the Day‑to‑Day

• Same‑Day Contracts. Most come back signed the day they’re sent with no USPS lag. 

• 5–7 Hours Saved each “extra‑pay” run, plus 3–4 Hours on the secondary payroll. 

• Enforced Compliance. Fraud‑training completion is visible and required inside Central. 

• Cleaner Data. Typed forms standardize packets and eliminate challenges reading handwritten timesheets. 

The intangible lift matters, too. “Hopefully we’re not killing as many trees with all the paper that we have printed in the past,” Jodi added, half‑laughing, half‑relieved. Fewer phone calls, fewer chases, fewer do‑overs, less postage, and time for other tasks. 

Why the Connected Suite Mattered

Mid‑East CTC didn’t need one more login or another isolated form tool. Central’s connected staff record and K‑12‑specific workflow engine, paired with integration with Absence and Time & Attendance, removed duplicate entry and created a single place to see progress, send reminders, and keep data accurate everywhere. That’s the day‑to‑day value. 

Less Paper, More Confidence

Jodi doesn’t mince words. “Anytime people ask me about electronic time sheets, I sing the praises of Frontline.” Then, the line that says everything about switching back: “If somebody ever told me that Frontline was going away, I would quit my job. I would not want to go back to the way I was doing it.”