I (we) categorically do not want BSF Managed ICT

[sjpage10]

Managed ICT

 

Our School does not Need want or require Managed ICT

 

We would of course love all new pc’s,servers whiteboards etc however we are well capable of looking after them ourselves and have no desire to pay a contractor to do this for the next god know how many years

 

We have

approximately 800 pupils 5

500 student computers

100 staff computers

 

2* 2003 domain servers (curriculum and admin)

Group Policy and other restriction software protect all our PC’s

1* 2003 Web server

Runs our ILP , VLE (Moodle) and Website (we have created and manage our own)

Lost count of how many whiteboard over 40 at last count

 

All our PC’s are exact clones (XP SP3 ie7) with all our software on every PC

Every PC in the school works and it takes us only minutes to repair/Replace any that have problems

 

We have over 30 mono laser printers and over 30 colour laser printer/scanners these cost us less than £150 each and only cost £4.50 per toner and have been in place over 2 years now (lol and we even managed to get all the secret drum rest codes)

 

Over 18 cctv cameras on 2 DVR units that cost us no more than £1000 to purchase and us install

 

All what we have done in the last 3 years has been on the cheap, yet we have managed to give the school everything and more that it requires

 

What’s the chance of any remote service doing this!

 

I understand that some school may benefit from Managed ICT support , I just feel we wont

 

 

What I want to know is , is there any central location that all those schools who don’t want Managed ICT through BSF can get together to find how to stop it ?

[Midget]

do you mean the royal we? How do you know the SMT aren't all for BSF?

[jsnetman]

cost £4.50 per toner

 

I would like to know which colour laser you can get toner for that price, unless it is a typo or you are filling your own cartridges?

[Chuckster]

Any school wanting out of BSF would be considered mad because of the funding they'll receive. My school is getting £2m of which £1.9m will be spent on building repairs and renovation, whilst the £145k will be spent towards the IT infrastructure (not what we need it) and curriculum content.

 

Like some of you, everything is all honky dory with all of our equipment. The only issues we have is probably just a few WBs missing their pens and whatnot, and one or two projectors need replacing. Everything else is fine.

 

My HT is already salivating at the prospect of turning my little cupboard into a corridor that leads out onto this walkway full of plants and shrubs and then onto a life skills centre.

 

I'm being TUPE'd over sometime this summer, even though BSF doesn’t initially kick in until summer 2011 (we're in wave 5). However, I'm hoping it'll lead to some new career opportunities within the MSP. (One can only hope)

[Gatt]

Our school is in the exact same position

We are due to move to RM in September

BUT.. the cost of moving to RM is proving to be very large, we would be in the red and be exactly as we are now with no new equipment..

 

I know the HT is questioning this and has also implied to RM and the LEA about not going through with it...

 

My only concern, is what would happen to me - if our school pulls out of BSF, how does it affect the TUPE process?

 

I'm concerned that if I wasn't TUPE'd that I could be made redundant by the LEA, since, in their eyes, my role is no longer available (due to TUPE)..

[GrumbleDook]

do you mean the royal we? How do you know the SMT aren't all for BSF?

And governors, teachers, parents, kids ....

[sjpage10]

Thanks for the reply guys, glad to see I’m not the only one

 

as far as I can tell our SMT are behind me, though they would like all new equipment (as would I) they have no desire to have to rely on remote management and from speaking to our accounts manager they have no desire whatsoever for a PFI build, as far as I can work out as half of our school is only a few year old whilst the other half is over 40 years , we would not get PFI however remote ICT management through BSF would still come in to effect

 

I know you can try to opt out of remote management ICT , but they make you jump through hoops to do this

 

Printers by the way are clx2160N Samsung colour laser we paid around£150 each for them a couple of years back (it would be easier to find rocking horse $hit than find them now ) and the pattern toners range between £4.50 and £5 each absolute bargain, mono's are Brother 5270DN's best we can get are toners for £12

 

 

sadly as for parents and kids , they will be sold on whatever the government tells them

 

just have to hope conservatives get in and stop it all

 

we could do with a website/Forum for all us IT guys who don’t want this so we can work together

 

Please forgive the poor grammer and typing , missies don’t appreciate me sitting typing on here at the weekend so have to type quick lol

 

PS

 

we also have 4 display board's that we put in these cost us approximately £450Flat Screen TV with cheap PC I wrote software so the PC's simply run a power point that can be updated at any time via a network share all staff have access to this and they also run tickers and a clock I wrote taking news from the BBC-

 

I also wrote software to allow users to change screen res via an icon in the systray this also forces desktop background (every 30 seconds) to the one set to stop them changing it (group policy just can not solve all issues)and also reads the Iexplorer header for key words to block sites by sending the 'Home' command to i.e. if a keyword is found just to block those sites our ISP let through

 

also a ict support request system that allows jobs to be posted to us with a date and time , urgency request etc..

 

oh and ID Badge printing software , that can be run on a laptop and create the badge from the cam on the laptop

print a batch on to A4 so they can be cut out and dropped into holders , all our staff have these now cost's next to nothing to do

 

and i forgot an account generator for 2003 simply import usernames from a list and it will create all accounts and shared folders (hidden or not) , though I know most of you will have scripts for this, makes setting the new y7 accounts up so easy just takes a few minutes for 120 accounts

 

 

if anyone wants the software just let me know

 

 

Oh and 2 years of backups on 2 *2TB raid NAS drives you just got to love ACRONIS ,replaced our sever a couple of years back with it using universal restore worked a treat

 

and all our network has been moved over to 1gb with a central managed 1gb switch OK only cheap 3com but it's all mapped out and works a treat

 

so you can see why I wouldn’t want to give it all up

 

Sorry if it sounds like I’m blowing my own trumpet , you know how unrewarding IT is no one knows your there until something goes wrong lol

Edited March 27, 2010 by sjpage10

[Guest monkeyx]

You need to start looking into an Alternative Procurement Business Case. The governors will need to be fully behind the decision.

 

The chances are the APBC will be rejected. You will then be left with a decision to pull out of ICT for BSF and lose the funding or take the service!

 

Tim

 

PS I can share some figures that prove that over 5 years walking away is a viable option!

[sjpage10]

Thanks for all the reply's everyone

 

As soon as I find the time I will create a website with a forum for all those who would love a new school and IT but don’t want Remote management or anyone else running their IT show

 

I will also include all the resources we can find

 

If anyone is interested and willing to help please say below

 

Unless the conservatives get in and scrap it all lol

[speckytecky]

Irrespective of whatever political hue dominates Westminster it's the Civil Servants who run the Country. Nowadays it seems that few of our politicians have the strength of character or leadership to make any difference at all.

 

-

Thanks for all the reply's everyone

 

As soon as I find the time I will create a website with a forum for all those who would love a new school and IT but don’t want Remote management or anyone else running their IT show

 

I will also include all the resources we can find

 

If anyone is interested and willing to help please say below

 

Unless the conservatives get in and scrap it all lol

[broc]

I think you will find an incoming Tory administration (if elected) will simply rebrand the BSF programme & continue where Labour left off, I suspect the BSF programme may be merged wth their academies programme as has happened in some LAs already. Don't forget PFI is a Tory policy that some may argue is executed badly by 'new Labour' when they occupied the political centre ground.

 

Sooner or later the Tories will find out that cutting back on public sector spending is not the only answer to curing our ailing economy. Maybe they aready realise this & that is why they are remarkably vague about what they will cut?

 

When the political parties say 'efficiency savings' they mean sacking workers.... conveniently ignoring the fact that unemployed workers cost the state unemployment benefits, lose tax and VAT revenues, and lead to a reduction in spending power.... all of which means 'people' will buy less & companies will sell less... ultimately meaning less profit for shareholders & Tory backers..... The last Tory administration squandered taxes from UK oil revenues paying for the unemployed.....

 

Regardless of the academic benefits of BSF, it is good business for the private sector who fund the Tories. Outsourcing ICT is the icing on the cake, intended to sweeten BSF contracts..... & reducing ICT staffing levels is one way to reduce costs & drive up profit

[GrumbleDook]

I would also suggest you grab hold of the 3rd annual review from PriceWaterhouseCooper too. It does talk about how managed services are settling down and that people are now seeing the improvements from it, but also does clearly show that the link between ICT and Transformation is not effective. Since a big thing about ICT in BSF is about transformation it shows that more work on the education side is seriously needed.

[PiqueABoo]

Since a big thing about ICT in BSF is about transformation it shows that more work on the education side is seriously needed.

 

Alternatively it might show that the transformation stuff was a utopian crock. It's very difficult to see that aspect having quite the same prominence under that potential Tory gov.

 

[Haven't read the report, so..]

[GrumbleDook]

Transformation is actually the bigger project than BSF. It is at the heart of changes to the National Curriculum, how OFSTED look at things, intervention from LAs, CPD for staff (and yes ... I know that for a heck of a lot of people that just means teachers but workplace reform also tries to address this too).

 

BSF is just a handy method of trying to introduce it and is almost part of the justification of BSF. However, it often means taking a risk when changing how things are done and due to the risk adverse nature of large projects, there is evidence that people are playing it far too safe ... and so transformation is stopped. If you don't have innovation in BSF it makes it damn near impossible to have transformational change.

[Guest theeldergeek]

Oh gawd, now I'm totally confused!

 

I've been told that BSF will not happen in East Sussex, but it seems, the wagon is still very much rolling in other parts of the country. I can't imagine East Sussex is being left out!

 

What's this about only one ICT Technician staying on site? Where does the rest of the 'team' go? I for one do not want to be locked up in a call centre for 8 hours a day!

[broc]

Authorities are invited to bid for funding, a long drawn out process. Some who do are successful, others fail. Those that fail can resubmit with modifications.... some do, some don't.

 

Some LAs have decided not to bid, others have decided to wait & see what happens after the General Election.....

 

As far as what happens to school-based technical support staff, there are no hard & fast rules, it depends largely upon the LA & their partners in the LEP who negotiate with the schools (in theory) to agree an affordable cost of ICT provision. The higher the cost the more onsite support.....

 

The most likely victims to suffer from this are network managers, especially where the LEP has chosen to centralise servers & server management. This may not happen immediately as it will take time to scale up the managed service. A 'new' managed service might only have 4-5 client schools, but it may have been designed for 20.... in my view the later you are in this sort of program the more you are at risk.... but this is all down to individual LAs & their BSF solutions....

Edited March 29, 2010 by broc

[PiqueABoo]

Transformation is

 

You're just not going to budge on this "then some magic happens" stuff, are you? ;b

 

::regroups::

 

There is a old book, non-fiction, that in an ideal world everyone would read. Perhaps I liked it because it reflected existing predjudice, I don't know, but plenty of other folk seem to get it. This is Papanek's "Design for the Real World: Human Ecology and Social Change". Forty years old now and some of the once radical memes were quite virulent and caught on, but having dipped in recently that just makes some of it more fascinating. It's a passionate tour de force and unless you're dead from the neck up you should emerge from that with a new (perhaps renewed) fondness for doing/creating socially responsible stuff that works.

 

With that in mind back at the educational ranch, I'm convinced I'm looking at socially irresponsible rhetoric, grandiose undeliverable promises, a direct consequence of Blair's messianic shtick. And having just skimmed one re. parental engagement, they've even got the pet research papers that are supposed to be academic founded on scientific method surely, talking about "quantum leaps" for [bleepity-bleep]!

 

It might improve educational life a bit here or there, but this transformational thing seems like the equivalent of staking your future on buying a couple of dozen lottery tickets and hoping one wins the jackpot. Reality and history are very strongly against that strategy and when it doesn't work there will be excuses, blame displacement ("but they were too risk adverse!") and further down the line history will likely remark on the arrogance or naivete or more likely, plain stupidity of it all.

[GrumbleDook]

Nope ... not going to budge.

 

Ok ... since we have different opinions on this how about taking it from another point of view.

 

If the school is not going to try new things at any time, take risks and experiment then I presume you are saying that it should stick with what they know right now.

 

What happens if they are a failing or satisfactory school? They need to change something to improve.

If they are a good school then how do they keep things going without coasting?

 

Outstanding schools stay outstanding because they change ...

 

Transformation is the buzzword for change. For some schools it is a small thing (or a series of small things) for others it is big ... get rid of leadership, change the curriculum, use technology differently (ranging from going open source through to introducing game based learning). It just doesn't get called change, but that doesn't quite cover how much planning and thinking is needed.

 

I know some of this will fall on deaf ears because you seem to have something against research done by Becta or DCSF ... but I've been out into enough schools now to see good examples of it working. People say they want examples of things in action ... and yep ... Papanek (only read abstracts and selected texts) did both the talk and practical examples ... so how about giving others a break when they want to give examples. If you want examples of transformation then there are a few places to start. Have a look at what has been going on today at the Games Based Learning conference. Yes ... a fair bit of rhetoric, but also lots of classroom teachers and SLTs talking about what works and how it has changed things.

 

For the cynics out there ... if you want to stick with simple, a standard template for IT, no change ... then surely you are advocating going for a managed service.

[sjpage10]

Lol just talked the boss and in his words

 

'This has already been discussed in depth with the head, the SMT, and the governors and under no circumstances whatsoever will we ever go to Managed ICT services as they could never be any benefit for us in doing so’

 

 

Have to hope they stay true to their word

 

It is quite obvious that the ICT side of the BSF is the big sweetener my guess this is what will happen

A Remote provider is given a 5 year contract, so can afford to sell initial Hardware at a loss

 

ICT Managers are given the elbow or demoted to technicians

 

On site support is dropped to one technician to teach staff how change toners and to ring the support line

 

One year on the ICT technician’s contract is not renewed (come on why you need to pay someone to put toners in and ring India)

 

3 years on time for some new PC’s only this time at full price as these machines are out of date and will no longer be supported that will be £500,000 please

 

4 years on a whole year with no support everything begins to fall apart

 

5 years on contract over, re-employ and IT Manager and some Technicians to make all the old work again only to find it’s all licensed to your RM service and you cant do anything with it Dohhh

 

Sorry to be a little cynical, but if I was a remote service provider this is exactly what I would do to maximise profit

 

I came across this little bit of wisdom whilst browsing

 

The mistake of the past is too much emphasis on technology – e.g. fast computers, expensive multimedia centres and broadcast stations, but with little attention to how they can effectively transform learning. Schools were wrong in adapting students to technology instead of adapting technology to students

 

ps

for what it's worth our ofsted report was the best in our area with lots of outstanding

Lol we had someone the other day trying to sell us a single sign on package, I'm sure they didn’t believe me when I told them we all ready had this lol! why would you pay for what microsoft does for free LDAP

Edited March 29, 2010 by EduTech
language

[Guest monkeyx]

Nope ... not going to budge.

 

For the cynics out there ... if you want to stick with simple, a standard template for IT, no change ... then surely you are advocating going for a managed service.

 

Perhaps some people disagree with having services that are managed from the centre.Hence the growth of Trust and Foundation schools. The scope and role of central services has been much reduced over recent years and more control given to schools. ICT under BSF reverses that decision.

 

Most people report that ICT in BSF has been mediocre, but is slowly getting better. EducationInvestor - Article: PwC finds that BSF is working - mostly

 

Why not leave the schools the choice to chose their own IT under BSF. From the schools I have spoken to, most have confirmed that it has stifled innovation and not always provided good value!

 

I hope that does not make schools that want a choice over ICT provision cynical. Indeed BSF acadamies are allowed to opt(not 100% sure as seems to vary between LAs) out to give them greater innovation.

 

In our own area they also attempted to take over Facilities management via BSF to transform the process. The schools rejected the move, as it restricted innovation and increased costs!

 

Hmm that is beginning to seem like a theme

 

Tim

[GrumbleDook]

Don't worry Tim ... I know where you are coming from.

 

The problem is that I, like you, have seen MSPs going into schools and it stifle things, slows things down, makes them take a step back in what they are doing with technology ... for a year, maybe two ... and then it generally evens out. There are some really bad problems for some places though .. and those are the problems we hear about most.

 

But when talking to some school SLT they accept the pain and then say that they find they are getting a more consistent service than they were previously. Do I blame the support staff in the school? No ... I blame the SLT for not getting to grips with things previously. I visited one school in another LA recently where the head complained about how it was a shock to find that on all kit they purchased there was a fee to cover the support and maintenance of it over the period of the contract. I asked if this was comparable to previous costs (ie take into account the salary of the existing support staff, any costs for external support, etc, etc) and she looked at me blankly, had no real idea what had been spent previously. This was a school that had no inventory because when the support folk had done one previously the bursar had said there was no point and it was a waste of time as they had the finance records to work from! And this was a school that consistently gets good from OFSTED.

 

How do you measure a school? If you want to see the lengths the measurement has to go to to justify whether it is viable against the managed service just have a look at Paul Haigh's blog from Notre Dame.

 

If you have the position of allowing schools the ultimate choice you run the risk of a school opting out and still cocking things up and wasting money. What would the minimum criteria be to be allowed to opt out?

 

1 - ICTMark?

2 - FITS trained support staff and at least on member of SLT?

3 - FMSiS?

4 - Good from OFSTED?

5 - 5 year school Dev plan with IT closely integrated in their?

6 - Fully provisioned VLE with examples of serious use?

7 - MIS which is used by all staff, accessible to parents *and* students?

 

And this is before you even get onto looking at what impact technology has on T&L ... before we go into safeguarding ... before we even start talking about policies and procedures ...

 

So ... considering that if money is going to be given to schools if they opt out of a managed service how would you set down some basic criteria to see whether they are suitable (considering the number of rants we have on here about people buying white elephants or wasting money in other ways) ... and then how would you measure that it is working effectively? I know that some of the reasons why IT is lumped in with BSF are to do with transformation , politics, finances, partnership with private companies, etc ... but it is also because schools waste money or don't plan for IT properly. Elements of Govt say that schools cannot be trusted (I don't agree with that ... some can't be ... most can, but they do need steering in the right direction) ... so please feel free to give suggestions how a school can justify opting out.

[broc]

While I agree in principle with what Grumbledook is saying (I often do ), I find it ironic that the Govt are saying schools cannot be trusted to spend ICT money wisely when we so frequently hear about the Govt not being capable of managing its 'own' spending.... & by that I don't mean MP expenses

 

Just ask yourself....

 

How many MoD procurements have failed to provide the forces what they need when they need it?

 

How many Govt ICT projects have gone pear shaped?

 

How many new schools built under BSF are open so far against the targets set? The LAs blame PfS for being so dogmatic & prescriptive, PfS blame the LAs for lacking the skills....

 

How many new school designs are considered satisfactory by CABE?

 

How much money has been wasted on urban regeneration, failing to deliver what people need - jobs. In some areas all that this massive state intervention & investment has succeeded in doing is making the communities totally dependent upon state handouts because so many households have no wage earners & are 2nd & 3rd generation long term unemployed.

 

The fact remains Local Government, aided by organisations such as BECTA, Partnership for Schools, Education Action Zones along with initiatives like Computers for Pupils have all frequently failed to deliver too.

 

So why should managed services courtesy of BSF be different? Which 'magic' component does BSF have, that all these other programmes, initiatives, projects don't?

 

Use OFSTED (or similar) to make schools shape up..... let schools have flexibility as long as they meet minimum standards.....

Edited March 30, 2010 by broc

[L_Jenkins]

so please feel free to give suggestions how a school can justify opting out.

 

Excuse me for jumping on the band wagon that is your conversation. But I think a school should be allowed to opt out of managed ICT because there is a good chance it will strongly affect the ICT teams lives.

 

I work in a small school (600 students, 100 staff (give or take)) with an IT team of 3, A network manager and two technicians (myself included). If our school was to have a managed ICT system the chances are we would lose all flexibility within our role as a support team. For instance the last couple of days we have been running cables through the ceiling to increase the connection into several offices. If this school was under a managed ICT team then that flexibility wouldn't be there. We would have to request permission from central and wait for a response, just to run a few cables to help out some colleauges. Yes new equipment would be nice, but not accross the whole school.

 

Not only that, there is a good chance the Network Manager will lose his job, or have his job turned into a technician. And from what I have heard they will reduce the ammount of support in a school anyway.

[GrumbleDook]

Use OFSTED (or similar) to make schools shape up..... let schools have flexibility as long as they meet minimum standards.....

 

Lots of very fair points ... but we have already seen that OFSTED have pulled out of the IT infrastructure side of things ... and most of us here have little faith in the ability of OFSTED to adequately assess that side of things anyway ... and then we have to remember that OFSTED actually only come in to verify the school SLT assessment of things. How many people have expressed concern that their SLT aren't in a position to make that assessment either.

 

So ... how do we assess that a school will meet the minimum criteria (once we decide what they are)?

[broc]

So ... how do we assess that a school will meet the minimum criteria (once we decide what they are)?

 

It's not hard; When I worked for a large Global IT Services provider, as a consultancy practice we were frequently employed to carry out technical audits of client computer systems far more complex than a typical school would have. We would look at all aspects of IT operation, planning, disaster recovery, security (including ethical hacking)...... by comparison a school would be a piece of cake

 

So, the skills exist in industry already to carry out the work, or perhaps the LA could employ its own IT auditors to work in its schools in the same way as they audit school finances?