Schoolbase or ISAMS - what would you decide

[Roguesooty]

We are an independant school and are looking to move away from CMIS. We have narrowed down our search of MIS systems to either Schoolbase or ISAMs.

 

What we would like to do is get opinions from schools that are actually using either provider as to whether they would recommend it and what experience they have had from it. If anyone could help I would be very grateful.

[vikpaw]

No experience of either i'm afraid, however i'm interested in any research you may have done to have narrowed down to those two.

Which other suppliers did you consider (Capita, Bromcom, Scholarpack)? What were your reasons for dismissing them?

I hate to start yet another discussion on who is better, but would just be interested in your findings. There was a thread a long time ago, comparing different MIS, i'll try and search it out.

[Ketlane]

Thoroughly happy with SchoolBase. What's impressing me now is that new staff are saying how pleased they are with it, how muc better it is that (whatever-it-was-in-their-last-place). We haven't considered a move since adopting SchoolBase so I really cannot comment on ISAMS. I think the key point about the Schoolbase product is that the questions they ask in development are "what do schools want and need" and "how will people use this"; there is very little technophobe barrier. Service has been excellent; one one occasion it was merely very good.

PM me if you want more.

[featured_spectre]

School base is decent, we trialled it here but the admin staff prefered SIMS to it (god knows why as schoolbase were more willing to add extra features / take stuff away etc).

 

ISAMS - a school down the road has this and they have nothing but trouble.

 

SIMS, or Schoolbase would be happy with!

[Roguesooty]

The narrowing down for us was quite simple. The main MIS competitors out there, like SIMS, Bromcom, simply cannot provide a package that meets all our needs and they are also more focused on the public sector rather than the private sector. We then looked at what a lot of other Independant schools were using and the vast majority of schools were using either ISAMS or Schoolbase. In fact if you look at both websites and see the list of schools that they have it is like a who's who of independant schools. That really made our minds up to look at these 2 though I have taken a look at others but to be honest they do not come close to what Schoolbase or ISAMS can do and offer.

[Roguesooty]

Hi Nephilim

Could you please PM me as I would like to ask you a couple of questions but cannot PM anyone until I have made more posts. Thank you!

[PhilNeal]

Roguesooty just for the record we have +500 Independent schools using our software.

[Roguesooty]

Hi Phil.

 

I apprecaite that you do have a number of Independant Schools using SIMS. I am simply saying that SIMS does not meet our needs and that because the public sector requires so much work and change that SIMS and also CMIS and other major providers have to spend so much time on keeping up with these changes and cannot dedicate enough resources to meet the demands of some Independant Schools. I also think that there is a fear of changing MIS systems as it requires such a lot of work and time. Therefore I think that it is often easier for schools to stay with what they have and make it work, rather than look for something else that more meets their needs. That is just the way I see it.

 

Other companies dedicated to only the Independant market are able to provide a more tailored and flexible solution and are starting to prove themselves very worthy of investigation. In our School we have had CMIS for 10 years and only now have we finally decided that it is time to bite the bullet and find something that can meet our needs. SIMS would have been a consideration given my own extensive background with SIMS but having seen what these Independant only companies can provide and services they offer it is very impressive.

[featured_spectre]

Roguesooty, all of my experience of the products I mentioned come from public sector usage, so I am not sure how much use I can be to you

 

PS

 

PM Sent

[Roguesooty]

Thanks for the PM. I should now be able to respond to it. Hurrah! any comments or impressions from anyone about Schoolbase or ISAMS is welcome.

[vikpaw]

Thanks for the PM. I should now be able to respond to it. Hurrah! any comments or impressions from anyone about Schoolbase or ISAMS is welcome.

You've met the requirements, so should be good to PM now

 

@Phil - I must be on my 4th account manager by now, not even sure who the current one is...

[powdarrmonkey]

Hi Nephilim

Could you please PM me as I would like to ask you a couple of questions but cannot PM anyone until I have made more posts. Thank you!

 

For the sake of everyone else watching this thread because they're facing the same decision, please keep discussion in the open unless it involves confidential information (which means you probably shouldn't be exchanging it with strangers in the first place...).

[PhilNeal]

Roguesooty thanks for your reply and I'm sorry that we don't meet your needs.

 

One top ten Independent School has changed to SIMS in the last 2 months having throughly reviewed the market and we have a number of others on our books.

[EdWhittaker]

How come Phil can plug SIMS at every opportunity, but last time I merely mentioned my company's product (on another thread) I got ripped to shreds? What am I missing?

[garrysaddington]

How come Phil can plug SIMS at every opportunity, but last time I merely mentioned my company's product (on another thread) I got ripped to shreds? What am I missing?

 

Likewise, my colleague got lambasted for merely posting about a useful paper that happened to have our name mentioned once in the whole document. I can't see where Capita have sponsored this forum? I personally have ceased to get involved in any discussion for fear of the backlash I get when people realise which product I am involved with!

[Toby.Belfield]

I have a couple of comments to make.

 

Firstly - I am the Principal of an Independent School, and we have just been nominated for the Independent School Awards, partly due to our use of the SIMS software. We use most of the modules - both the financial and academic ones - and our staff find the software easy to use. As a Principal, I find that the data I need (which is largely performance analysis information) is brought to my desktop without me having to search or carry out my own analyses. Our students have tests in their academic subjects almost every week, this data goes into SIMS and an appropriate analysis is pushed to heads of department/year/deputy heads and myself. Thousands of marks are analysed - and this information is used to inform progress of the children. We have seen, this year, our league table position rise from around 440 to 107. We have cut our costs dramatically - by removing large quantities of paper (eg all bills are emailed, no paper copies sent out now, all payslips are emailed, no paper payslips, all weekly newsletters to parents are emailed - and all reports are provided electronically.) We do not currently enter merits/demerits - but this is our next step. I would like parents to see House Points (Harry Potter style) through this system, online, alongside test results.

 

Secondly, I think it is very useful for Phil to be able to post on these threads. I do not view his comments as glib "sales" speak. I find many of the comments informative, helpful - and I would hope (and believe) that he takes back the comments made by us (the users) to his development/sales/product teams in Capita.

[garrysaddington]

 

Secondly, I think it is very useful for Phil to be able to post on these threads. I do not view his comments as glib "sales" speak. I find many of the comments informative, helpful - and I would hope (and believe) that he takes back the comments made by us (the users) to his development/sales/product teams in Capita.

Are you the same Toby Belfield that was deputy director of Capita, only 3 years ago?

[PhilNeal]

Sorry that I've overstepped the mark in this posting; I was trying to correct a factual inaccuracy and got carried away.

[Toby.Belfield]

Are you the same Toby Belfield that was deputy director of Capita, only 3 years ago?

 

Yes, I am the same Toby Belfield! But - now as a Head, do you think I'd seriously put my school at risk if the product wasn't right!!

[vikpaw]

Lets try and stick to discussing the MISes referred to in the OP.

Thanks.

[EdWhittaker]

Woah! I didn't see any mods weighing in with 'back on topic' when I was getting roasted. It's just that that there seems to be two sets of rules operating here, one for the big guys and one for the small guys - and guess who's getting the thick end of the stick?.

Ok, had my say, back on topic...

[Vic12345]

Referring back to the original question, we are an independent school who moved from SchoolBase to iSAMS over 2 years ago now, and are entirely happy with the move. We found SchoolBase to be a little limiting, particularly with academic reports and although SB tried to be accommodating in terms of adjusting the system to cope with this, it made the system quite volatile and staff became hesitant using it.

 

Staff now are a lot happier using iSAMS and find it easy and intuitive, some comments are that there is a lot happening on screen though it can be quite easily managed to ensure you are only viewing what is necessary.

 

The level of support from both companies is good, we found iSAMS startup and transition support excellent which made the move very easy.

 

The change from SB to iSAMS has worked very well for us mainly due to the more intuitive nature of iSAMS and it is a decision we are pleased with.

[scholarpack]

Yes, I am the same Toby Belfield! But - now as a Head, do you think I'd seriously put my school at risk if the product wasn't right!!

 

Might have been an idea to mention that!

[vikpaw]

Woah! I didn't see any mods weighing in with 'back on topic' when I was getting roasted. It's just that that there seems to be two sets of rules operating here, one for the big guys and one for the small guys - and guess who's getting the thick end of the stick?.

Ok, had my say, back on topic...

 

It's funny because i recall having to edit the posts and delete many others that were derailing the thread. Then my fellow mod Witch asked for a return to the original question. Perhaps we are thinking of 2 different occasions. In my example the OP was about an error in a particular piece of software, and a post talking about another product was a little out of line and reported as such.

 

In this thread SIMS/Capita have been mentioned 3 times by different people already, the guidelines do allow for companies to respond to legitimate queries about their products, though in this case it was borderline, and after it was reported is being discussed in the mods forum.

 

Please note that neither of the people complaining in this thread are registered as having reported any of the posts in question, if you don't follow the procedures we can't follow ours. Sorry if this appears unfair but we are volunteers following guidelines set out for us.

[Roguesooty]

Thank you to all who have posted about Schoolbase and iSAMS. All information has been of use in our deliberations.

 

We have had both Schoolbase and iSAMS now deliver a presentation each and we are currently now deliberating as to who we go with. This takes some time as a lot of people from accross lots of different areas of the school have been involved and need to have some input into the decision but hopefully within the next couple of days we will have decided. When we do decide I will post up here who we have gone with and our reasons... if people would find this information useful??

 

Just on a side note to Phil and to Toby; SIMS is a good product and when I first started here I would have encouraged a lot of people to move to SIMS. However after seeing just how our school works and seeing what the demands are SIMS would not have met our requirements. This I know becuase prior to being at this School I used to work for Capita SIMS in various roles in regional centres and also at Bedford HQ for about 8 years. I was on the frontline working with Schools and LA's for all that time. This is how I knew that SIMS would not work in our School.

 

Anyway staying on topic if people would like me to post up here who we go with and how we came to our decision then I'll be happy to if it will be useful.