State of Progresso in 2016?

[sonofsanta]

I've just come out of a meeting with our account manager @ Advanced to discuss the new reporting suite (ProMetrix) and talk has turned, as expected, to Progresso.

 

We looked at it 4 years ago, and it looked promising, but the horror stories, oh the horror stories. We're currently running FacilityCMIS quite happily on a virtual 2008R2 server, so I've no pressing need to change anything until the end of maintenance, ~2020. But for that reason, I've not looked into Progresso for some time, so I was wondering: is anyone using it now and happy with it? Is it a worthwhile improvement on Facility + ePortal?

 

This is very much just a curiosity post and we wouldn't likely move for a couple of years or more, but it'd be nice to get an idea of where sentiment and thought currently lies.

[jwebb123]

We migrated to Progresso from CMIS and are happy with it. The reports are much better than CMIS. They key thing is the widgets for staff and the ability of the system to email data to staff, rather than wait for me to run a report. Please feel free to come and view the MIS, but we are in Portsmouth.

[sonofsanta]

We migrated to Progresso from CMIS and are happy with it. The reports are much better than CMIS. They key thing is the widgets for staff and the ability of the system to email data to staff, rather than wait for me to run a report. Please feel free to come and view the MIS, but we are in Portsmouth.

 

Portsmouth is a bit of a distance! We've asked our account manager for a nearby school we can visit, but they'll always pick one favourable to them, so a broader view of sentiment on here is helpful as well.

 

Thank you!

[SimonRushton]

We started to use Progresso at the beginning of the academic year (but I used it in my previous school from 2012).

 

The system produces stunning reports, that are designed around our assessment model not a generic one, which are providing teachers and leaders with information they can use to impact directly on learning - that is 'core business' and a big tick in the box!

 

Behaviour management is also a big plus, partly thanks to in situ data collection and partly, again, thanks to the power of the reporting engine and its ability to produce tailored information in realtime (in widgets) which help interventions to be timely and appropriate.

 

Priorities now are; increasing the system's use by parents and students of the online portal which is an integral part of the system - enabled simply by creating appropriate user accounts and developing cluster reports.

 

To address the 'horror stories' aspect: a lot of these relate to performance and a time when the system was very young, not on Amazon servers, in an era when broadband was much slower for most schools than it is now. Others often relate to what we think of as key but not core - e.g. Exam administration, office administration, etc. Thankfully Advanced focused on these early doors and processes are much quicker and simpler to execute and maintain.

 

We are in Plymouth so a little easier than Lincolshire to get to, you would be very welcome to visit when the time is right for you.

[sonofsanta]

The system produces stunning reports, that are designed around our assessment model not a generic one, which are providing teachers and leaders with information they can use to impact directly on learning - that is 'core business' and a big tick in the box!

 

This is key to our interests--our assessment models can be a little funky, and change across key stages--so this is really good to hear.

 

As to visiting Plymouth--it's me that's in Lincolnshire, I'm afraid, 5 hours away! Thank you for the offer though.

[djrscally]

Used to work for Advanced, now Data Manager at Bradford MAT. Feel free to come look at it if that's easier than Plymouth.

 

It has definitely changed drastically for the better, both in general functionality and also in performance. It does still have its problems and performance is at times still one of them (and sometimes in areas I would call Core), though the frequency and severity of those problems is much reduced from the old days. My big problem these days is that when Staff can't get on Progresso or it seems to be running slowly they'll assume its to blame as that used to be the case, whereas these days it's much more likely to be an internet outage.

 

As Simon mentions the reporting engine is excellent, but it does have something of a learning curve so you will need to drop a couple of tech savvy people onto some training to get the best out of it. Doesn't necessarily have to be training by Advanced - Progresso uses SSRS which is a Microsoft Package, I thoroughly recommend Wise Owl trainers (they also do a Youtube series). The reports library that Progresso comes with (as in, the built in system reports that are not tailored specifically to your school) was a touch lackluster to the point that we don't use many of them, however it has been improved considerably of late and many of the reports that we built now have an equivalent supplied as default by Advanced.

 

tl;dr - is it better than the horror story days? Drastically, it's a well functioning MIS now. Does it still have little annoying niggly things and stuff you wish it did but doesn't? Yeah sure but what doesn't - certainly they're no worse than Facility's annoying stuff. Is it worth moving from Facility to Progresso? In my opinion yes, but other MIS's exist and you should look at them too.

Edited July 27, 2016 by djrscally

[NotSoFast]

I'd echo the other posts. We waited until the initial problems with migration were resolved and also benefited from the move to AWS. It works really well for us and you're welcome to come and see (Norwich this time, but just a short drive behind a tractor along the A17/A47). :-)