Anyone use the Bromcom system?

[psydii]

I've found the bromcom support team variable, but significantly improved over the last 18 months.

 

Provided the timetable and bromcom administrator talk and understand what they are doing and the relationship between the core MIS and e-school everything works quite well.

 

A number of times we have been able to discover what is going wrong in sims from the window the bromcom system provides.

 

Our Attendance team really like the reports e-school provides compared to sims attendance and the teachers are all very comfortable using the fast efficient (though spartan) winfolder interface. In addition from time to time our sims system goes down as our LEA unpick the latest botched patch, e-school and winfolder allow for continues registration and access to pupil contact information.

 

The icing on the cake is that our PE department are extremely keen to move to winfolderPE.

[monkey_boy]

We use bromcom quite successfully, using WinFolder and WinFolderPK. We don't get many techinical problems with it, but i understand from the data admin people that it leaves a lot to be desired. Also, the customer service isn't great. We stuck with it because we had their 2g wnet wireless version and were familiar with it, but i think the SIMS system is definitly worth a look. especially if you're using a few other modules in SIMS.

[BadComputerDay]

We use it on laptops and find it extremely reliable and very easy to use. The staff generally like it. If teachers like it and use it, what more can be said

[RobFord]

We recently got the Bromcom timetable software, its the best tt package weve used to date. The head is now considering Bromcoms Registration package as weve had enough with lm. Is the rest of their software at a similar level? Ive heard from a friend whos used it elsewhere their behaviour module is good

[R-O-B]

We are considering getting Bromcom at our place solely for eRegistration. At the moment we use Sims.net for everything else but no teaching staff have access to it.

 

SMT have expressed a preference for using the registration module for Sims which would be cheaper. However I think it will create a lot more work in installing and troubleshooting Sims on 65+ teachers laptops and they will panic when the monthly update runs even though they have been told to expect it. I have also been told that accessing the Sims database puts more traffic on the network than the Bromcom method. This is relevant to us as it will mostly be carried out over the wireless network.

 

The plan is to have all staff accessing bromcom via the web interface to cut down on troubleshooting, software installation and updating on the clients machines. Is anyone else using the bromcom web interface?

 

Any thoughts on my idea or alternative solutions welcome.

[towen]

We use the Bromcom System here at our School and have been for 3years now.

 

We have the e-registration, e-markbook, e-behaviour, e-timetable, e-Analysis modules at our site.

 

Therefore I would recommend the Bromcom e-reg system to anyone over the SIMS solution for electronic registration as I believe it has more to offer than its competitors.

 

Our staff take there registers using the Winfolder Application as they all have laptops, staff don't seem to have many problems with it either which is always a bonus, although this does mean that the teaching staff have to remember to bring there laptop to school each morning.

 

As for taking registers via the webpage this is also possible if required, but I think this is more complicated than using Winfolder.

 

The support that comes with the Bromcom System has always been nothing short of excellent, response to problems\issues raised are usually fixed with in a day or so, Which is always a bonus..

[Mr_T]

I had Bromcom in my school within the Blackpool LEA. The LEA had a central server which all the schools connected to. A few schools ended up buying there own local severs or scraping it.

 

I found actual registration not too bad after lots of initial teething issues. However 2 years later and they still hadnt fixed some of the issues our attendance officer had with some of thier reports.

 

There telephone support was pants but their onsite engineer was pretty good.

 

I now have PARS here which so far seems infinately better!

[t_guest]

we dont use the Bromcom system no more we use sims.net ......

[wishingmoon]

:?:

[damo]

we have been using pars for the last year and have had no problems, other than the odd one caused by sims falling over. it sits on top of sims.

advice would be to ensure that the server it sits on is powerful.

its very easy to use and administer.

[StArbiter]

Anyone see the Panorama program last night ? Some of our staff, pupils and parents are now asking about the safety of the Bromcom wifi system. If John Condon is still watching please put our minds at rest and post something on teh forum.

[Ric_]

Anyone see the Panorama program last night ? Some of our staff, pupils and parents are now asking about the safety of the Bromcom wifi system. If John Condon is still watching please put our minds at rest and post something on teh forum.

 

See http://edugeek.net/index.php?name=Forums&file=viewtopic&t=8740

[Bromcom_John]

I have checked out the Bromcom position on this one and one of our staff also attended the WiFi conference at Olympia this week to check on other potential concerns. The program makes a lot out of potential problems with radiation and young skulls and possible extra sensitivity to radiation of young children. We should first off note that Bromcom is a teacher based system with no hand held wireless devices being issued to the children. Some of our users have our original G1/G2 technology which emits at 0.25 milliWatts versus typical WiFi which is 100 milliWatts or 0.1 Watt. Users of our WinFolder product, if used over WiFi minimises the use of wireless because of its "super efficient" data package construction. The company's response to the radiation question is to refer to the Health Protection Agency see http://www.hpa.org.uk/radiation/understand/radiation_topics/emf/wifi.htm and further infomation on subsequent links including http://www.hpa.org.uk/radiation/understand/radiation_topics/emf/wlans.htm which conclude that on the basis of current scientific information WiFi equipment satsifies international guidelines...and there is no reason why schools and others should not use WiFi equipment. As always it is very difficult to prove a negative - how can anyone prove that WiFi is not harmful? Its really down to someone to prove that it is harmful and that has not been done yet. The poster - Vegas- already did a good summary on May 21 including the same references to the Health Protection Agency such as "WiFi devices are of a very low power, much lower than mobile phones".

 

Hope that helps to allay any fears..

[StArbiter]

Many thanks John - have a good week end.