Is there any MIS for secondary schools that comes close to SIMS

[JamesParker]

Hi All I know SIMS is based on an old product and that it has had a lot of updates and it has its problems, however is there any MIS systems that are better for secondary schools ? and what do people think will happen when SIMS goes to the cloud ?

 

 

James

[AlistairB1983]

It very much depends on how you define 'better'. However that being said, I do think that almost everyone who uses an alternative to SIMS would say they're a vast improvement over it.

[grahamd22]

We are moving to Arbor this coming Feb half-term so we will have to see, as we were using SIMS for over 20 years previously !!

[MartinT]

We are a SIMS user and so far have had iSAMS and Engage come and present to us. We will have ESS present this Friday and will then decide on our future MIS.

 

Personally, I would eliminate iSAMS and make the final consideration between Engage and SIMS 8.

[JamesParker]

Yes by better i mean , better in all areas for exams, reports,management etc. it’s no good us changing sims only to find one area is a massive let down ?

Does anyone know what percentage of the secondary school market Sims has?

[Aprice]

The main site we support is with Bromcom, I have to say I'm not a big fan, just feels clunky and just find the interface a bit confusing. I miss the usability of SIMS just not the constant pain of updates.

 

That said I think SIMS has had its time and I wouldn't suggest putting it in a new school now, or switching to it.

 

By the sounds of it they are developing web based components now that talk back to the same old server (which sounds exactly what PARS was 5 years ago)

 

We've got one other customer on hosted SIMS, which while it's hands off for us, I'm not sure its a great experience from them, feels very much like Server 2012 and RDS

Edited January 31, 2023 by Aprice

[Linfit]

Having spent most of the last year researching engaging and deciding on what to change to I came to the conclusion that either Arbor or Bromcom are both better than SIMS.

We went with Bromcom in the end as I think it is the more developed product.

 

From what I have seen, the cloud based SIMS is a fudge and their project to move everything one bit at a time is doomed to fail - it will take too long, and if they end up simply replicating SIMS rather than starting again from scratch it will still not be as good as the competition.

 

There was essentially no development work or modernisation effort on SIMS that got anywhere for 8 or 9 years, and its going to be impossible for them to catch up now.

[JamesParker]

There was essentially no development work or modernisation effort on SIMS that got anywhere for 8 or 9 years, and its going to be impossible for them to catch up now.

Lol i bet the original programmers have long since retired and Therein lies the problem

 

ah a quick wiki

Claiming over 80% market share across the primary and secondary sectors

Initial release1984

Edited January 31, 2023 by JamesParker

[TechMonkey]

I think I can safely say that all the big players come close, pass and then surpass SIMS by a long way. I was going to write a simile between SIMS and an infectious disease but it got too long and tortuous. Lets just say the bits you know are the issue and shouldn't be under played.

 

As for what will happen when SIMS goes to the cloud? A large part of me thinks it never will, it will rumble along, promises made, never delivered, and bits may end up web based but overall it will just get messier and more disjointed.

[JamesParker]

I think they became to contented by the fact they have such a big chunk of the market, when they should have been devolving a replacement years ago

 

though what a massive undertaking !

Edited January 31, 2023 by JamesParker

[Jaan]

We had been using SIMs for over 20 years and were used to it. However, after switching to Bromcom, the change has been a no-brainer. Bromcom offers more features than SIMs and with the staff app, staff can access MIS from their pockets from their Google work policies.

 

We have also saved money by eliminating third-party apps/subscriptions that Bromcom can handle natively. The web-based system has eliminated the need for SIMs updates and backups, making it a game changer.

 

However, there has been a huge learning curve for most staff, despite training. Some staff members may resist change and say "It worked on SIMs" or "It's too complicated." This is a result of breaking old habits, like the transition from Office to Google. Some staff may also find it difficult to adjust, as evidenced by a staff member who left because of the change.

 

Leadership must be on board for a smooth transition and to help break old habits. Our move from SIMs to Bromcom has not been without challenges, but the benefits outweigh them. We do not miss SIMs and would not go back to it. Although the move to Bromcom has been stressful, mainly due to internal issues, we do not regret it. Bromcom has received more feature updates in the last 18 months than SIMs ever did. Moving to other MIS options such as Arbor may have similar challenges.

[JamesParker]

Jaan: i was always lead to believe that Bromcom was ok for primary schools but not for secondary’s, seems that may longer be true Edited January 31, 2023 by JamesParker

[TechMonkey]

I think they became to contented by the fact they have such a big chunk of the market, when they should have been devolving a replacement years ago

 

Most certainly. I remember when they finally made the move from DOS modules and that was a drawn out complicated affair, even then everyone was looking to move but didn't have the inertia. As someone else mentioned it has been an open secret that no one in the company full understands the code base anymore, it had sprawled and been added to and added to, never properly integrated or simplified.

[2ilent8cho]

Dumped SIMS and went to iSAMS 6 years ago and we are much happier. The only part that for us SIMS did better was Cover. We do things that were not even possible in SIMS, it was holding us back.

[psydii]

This is something I have been wrestling with for a while. We are good at SIMS. Updates aren't really a problem (a bit of work for the helpdesk for a few days every four months, but mostly they just work - - and our RDS server is there for anyone whose local sims install isn't working during the first hour of the day after an update because they took their laptop home last night, against advice). It is relatively snappy, it collects the data and produces the reports we need, we have three third-party 'best of category' products that fill in gaps, but they write back to SIMS. None of the other MIS's are as good at these things as these third party products. It all might be costing more, but it is better. (well so we think)

 

So I suppose what I'd be interested in hearing is, if you are a school that is good at SIMS, and already has good/great 3rd party products improving on areas you feel SIMS is lacking, and you have decided to (or have completed) a move away to an alternative MIS solution, leaving SIMS and 3rd party's behind - what was your motivation.... what drove the move... how did you bring those users who were happy with the status quo along, particularly where the new was not as good for them as the SIMS/3rd Party? I'm thinking the data team, the timetabler, the behaviour "team" (if you have a good third party product for this already), did you find you had to make changes to staffing (in admin roles) in order to respond to how the MIS made some tasks easier / more difficult?

 

Related: You have to run a procurement because the contract is up for renewal... how do you capture and evaluate your requirements when you are potentially comparing a collection of products to a single party offering of the alternative MIS's?

[psydii]

Jaan: i was always lead to believe that Bromcom was ok for primary schools but not for secondary’s, seems that may longer be true

Wasn't even true in 2014. Back then it would have been a brave decision to move from SIMS to Bromcom as a secondary school, but Serco/Progresso was imploding and many of the others were still too new or too stagnant, it made a suitable non-SIMS replacement to any of the competition.

 

These days I can't speak from personal experience, but bringmoredata's analysis shows continuous growth and low churn, which implies it's definitively good enough for many. (Arbor, IMHO was "too new" back in 2014, also shows these properties, now with a comparable customer base to Bromcom, and its growth rate this year well outstripping Bromcom. (caution: variation in LA/MAT wins can dramatically skew this value year on year, and of course the SIMS 3 year lock in will have a chilling effect on growth rates for all its competition)

[Jaan]

I think the covid lockdown was the nail in the coffin for us with regards to SIMs. We became very aware needed a MIS that was Web based to compliment our web based working.

 

We could have totally operated remotely. when able, we had to have a small team onsite to access SIMs (and maintain it along with the machines that ran it ).

 

We only needed remote access due to SIMs, and that got removed in light of the malicious attempts around that same time. So SIMs became site access only..... and people didn't like that.......

[TechMonkey]

This is something I have been wrestling with for a while. We are good at SIMS. Updates aren't really a problem (a bit of work for the helpdesk for a few days every four months, but mostly they just work - - and our RDS server is there for anyone whose local sims install isn't working during the first hour of the day after an update because they took their laptop home last night, against advice). It is relatively snappy, it collects the data and produces the reports we need, we have three third-party 'best of category' products that fill in gaps, but they write back to SIMS. None of the other MIS's are as good at these things as these third party products. It all might be costing more, but it is better. (well so we think)

 

So I suppose what I'd be interested in hearing is, if you are a school that is good at SIMS, and already has good/great 3rd party products improving on areas you feel SIMS is lacking, and you have decided to (or have completed) a move away to an alternative MIS solution, leaving SIMS and 3rd party's behind - what was your motivation.... what drove the move... how did you bring those users who were happy with the status quo along, particularly where the new was not as good for them as the SIMS/3rd Party? I'm thinking the data team, the timetabler, the behaviour "team" (if you have a good third party product for this already), did you find you had to make changes to staffing (in admin roles) in order to respond to how the MIS made some tasks easier / more difficult?

 

Related: You have to run a procurement because the contract is up for renewal... how do you capture and evaluate your requirements when you are potentially comparing a collection of products to a single party offering of the alternative MIS's?

 

The issue is, you don't know what you don't know and can't always see tangible benefits for things you haven't experienced.

 

Slight hyperbole but if you wanted to enter F1 and you had your car and you were happy with it, it goes pretty fast, finishes the race, with some modifications takes corners brilliantly you would think you had a pretty damned good product and would be confident. When you rolled out a Robin Reliant everyone else might think differently. Currently you are happy where you are and doing what you are doing, but could something new help you do it better in a different way? Is where you are good because you have reached the limits of what that system can do?

 

It is really tricky to overcome corporate inertia and there will be an organisational fear of change. Is it worth it? That is up to the organisation to decide, but flipping it around, can the school afford not to?

[Julian]

We are a secodary school using Bromcom, hosted in the cloud, and have used it now for over 5 years. Service uptime is pretty good, and they take care of all updates. Being web based makes working from home easy, and of corse it will work on PC, Chromebooks, Macs, and mobile phones (Fire Drill, out in the tennis courts).

[Ex-MGSTech]

I think part of the issue is potentially none of the "alternative" MIS systems does everything SIMS does "better"

Arbour for instance has no built in timetabling, which for a primary is not an issue, but for a large secondary is a huge issue. (Yes I'm ware there are third party "add on's" available, but it's not part of the core MIS.

We are also using a third party add on to SIMS called Talaxy, its a web based update to the TASC Software PARS we have used for over 17 years! It did, (and still does) fill the gaps in the daily functionality that isn't easily accessible in SIMS, and makes 90% of whet we need web accessible. Almost the best of both worlds, except we still have to maintain SIMS!

 

(I have no commercial affiliation to any of the above vendors!)

[syan]

Used hosted SIMS in previous school and currently use Arbor for our new secondary, and looking to move our primaries from Progresso to Arbor as well. The assessment module for Arbor secondary is really frustrating and as someone else mentioned, there is no sub-programme for timetabling like Nt6 in SIMS. That said, I would never move back to SIMS, and no forward-thinking MAT should either.

[nicholab]

The biggest issue is one member of SLT will be a SIMS addict and have the ear of the Head. If you can get round this and have a proper look at the market you will be doing well.

 

Benefits are the platform and software are managed by the product provider. Your most valuable data is then on different infrastructure to your local network.

 

Some thing like timetabling is often the sticking point it was easier in SIMS. There almost needs be some tough love it a better complete product so get on and change.

Edited January 31, 2023 by nicholab

[Norphy]

I miss the usability of SIMS just not the constant pain of updates.

 

This comment has made me raise my eyebrows so high, I think there's a hole in my ceiling.

 

Do you really find SIMS usable, or are you just used to it?

Edited January 31, 2023 by Norphy

[nicholab]

What I noticed with usability is having worked at a Bromcom school none of the specialist areas had gone for training. I am talking Exams Office and Timetabler had not done the training and said SIMS was better when that what they had had training on in the past.

 

Training is a key part of usability, have you main user base been trained how to use it in an every day contexted? You then need to make sure power user keep there hand in and get the right training and reference materials. The biggest issue being is that MIS system are a closed shop it very hard to get you hand on reference material unless you have the right access to a support contract.

 

It one of the key school system but there never seem to be time for training in using it.

Edited January 31, 2023 by nicholab

[Aprice]

This comment has made me raise my eyebrows so high, I think there's a hole in my ceiling.

 

Do you really find SIMS usable, or are you just used to it?

 

I suppose I see why you say that, but after spending ages trying to figure out how to get Bromcom to spit out a basic report, the novelty of a pretty GUI wore off quite quickly. Something that I'd worked out how to do in SIMS in a couple of mins. (Only really started to use SIMS about 2 years ago, before that provided it opened alright that was about as far as I got)

 

I do tend to feel like I'm using the web based version of excel rather than the desktop version, the web one solves half the problems people moan at me every day about but just doesn't quite 'work' as well as the desktop version.

 

All this said I certainly won't be suggesting they go out and put SIMS in