PhilNeal Posted July 13, 2011 Posted July 13, 2011 We are planning an evaluation session in Birmingham on Tues 20th Sept focusing on Assessment and Finance should schools want to find out more about how SIMS handles these issues.
NorthernSands Posted July 13, 2011 Posted July 13, 2011 Summat ain't logical there! CMIS is tied to pre-defined Templates!?In SIMS AM7 you can set up what you want to do whatever you want to do!So isn't that MORE flexible and LESS tied-down??? I tend to agree with @Sivadam here, in that SIMS is more flexible. However, I've seen a demo of assessment in CMIS and, although less flexible, it does seem to make it easier to create one style of marksheet and have that style applied to many other subjects, rather than having to create each subject's marksheet template from, more or less, scratch. All in all though, I much prefer the short-term-pain-long-term-gain of SIMS over anything else I've seen. I just wish it wasn't quite so painful. 1
Sivadam Posted July 13, 2011 Posted July 13, 2011 (edited) I tend to agree with @Sivadam here, in that SIMS is more flexible. However, I've seen a demo of assessment in CMIS and, although less flexible, it does seem to make it easier to create one style of marksheet and have that style applied to many other subjects, rather than having to create each subject's marksheet template from, more or less, scratch. All in all though, I much prefer the short-term-pain-long-term-gain of SIMS over anything else I've seen. I just wish it wasn't quite so painful. The very flixibility of SIMS does make the setting up of the original Template time-consuming (but not difficult!). However, once they are done once they can be used for ever! Or until you need to edit them (maybe because DfE, or some other body, moves the goalposts!) And the fact that you can clone them, as well as edit them, also makes this easy to do. It is because of this flexibility, tied to the fact that you can easily invent your own criteria, that I keep asking why some people think that AM7 cannot do what other systems do, whatever MIS they use! It may be that somebody does come up with such an example, and prove me wrong, but it always seems to go quiet when I pose the question! Edited July 13, 2011 by Sivadam
APC Posted July 13, 2011 Posted July 13, 2011 SIMS is not as flexible as CMIS in assessment for numerous reasons... some of which were covered in the post from TLI above.. Many of the issues raised in the technical assessment seminar at the recent SIMS Conference were questions on 'basic' functionality that already exists within CMIS and has done for the last 15years!... Capita's response to most of these requests were that it may be made possible in the next platform.... as no development is going to happen in the current SIMS platform apart from 'polishing'.. Perhaps some of the SIMS converts here have only seen the standard fixed models within CMIS - it is a much more confirguable system than SIMS, which is a shame as sims has other areas where things are easier - such as data import/export , but why would you need to use excel if the MIS is capable of doing all you need in the first place...
Beduffshirl Posted July 13, 2011 Posted July 13, 2011 T It is because of this flexibility, tied to the fact that you can easily invent your own criteria, that I keep asking why some people think that AM7 cannot do what other systems do, whatever MIS they use! It may be that somebody does come up with such an example, and prove me wrong, but it always seems to go quiet when I pose the question! One example is that Sims will not let you use a formula to calculate a column once and once only and then make that Column editable without the original formula kicking in again and overwriting it. This is a very useful and used feature in Facility and can't be done in Sims .Net
emma_24_uk Posted July 13, 2011 Posted July 13, 2011 I went to the Serco 'Progresso' demo yesterday and was pleased to hear confirmation from serco on the future of facility finance which as GregJ states above removes any need for us to look at other MIS systems at all... Progresso seems to be the way forwards with data being made available to leadership automatically as and when its needed - far better than anything Ive seen in discover for example... I wait in anticipation to see more in the Autumn term....
NorthernSands Posted July 13, 2011 Posted July 13, 2011 One example is that Sims will not let you use a formula to calculate a column once and once only and then make that Column editable without the original formula kicking in again and overwriting it. This is a very useful and used feature in Facility and can't be done in Sims .Net This is true, I haven't found an easy way to do this in SIMS and it would be useful. To a certain extent I can get around this, but not in an ideal way.
Sivadam Posted July 13, 2011 Posted July 13, 2011 (edited) One example is that Sims will not let you use a formula to calculate a column once and once only and then make that Column editable without the original formula kicking in again and overwriting it. This is a very useful and used feature in Facility and can't be done in Sims .Net You could do that by producing a Marksheet from any Template that includes the formula. Then calculate the Marksheet. Then produce a new data entry column for the data required (it could actually be there from the start!), and copy the results of the formula column into into that data entry column. The Formula column could then be removed from the Template or could be hidden - just in case you changed your mind and wanted to do the calculation again 10 years later! This is quite a simple procedure really - as compared to some others that I could think of e.g. one Marksheet/Template picks up Formula calculations from one or more different Marksheet/Templates! In fact, this is a better way of doing it as the links to the different Marksheets will always be present and the Marksheet containing the formula could just be available to the owner! Edited July 13, 2011 by Sivadam
Beduffshirl Posted July 13, 2011 Posted July 13, 2011 You could do that by producing a Marksheet from any Template that includes the formula. Then calculate the Marksheet. Then produce a new data entry column for the data required (it could actually be there from the start!), and copy the results of the formula column into into that data entry column. The Formula column could then be removed from the Template or could be hidden - just in case you changed your mind and wanted to do the calculation again 10 years later! This is quite a simple procedure really - as compared to some others that I could think of e.g. one Marksheet/Template picks up Formula calculations from one or more different Marksheet/Templates! In fact, this is a better way of doing it as the links to the different Marksheets will always be present and the Marksheet containing the formula could just be available to the owner! That is not really a viable solution as the process of copying, and pasting etc needs to be redone if a new child enters the class. It is also a very longwinded process for a Primary school to do, particularly as they will have to repeat it in many marksheets for different subjects and year groups/classes. Our tracking templates also take colour from calculated targets through hidden formula columns. This would not be possible with the suggested solution.
resin1 Posted July 13, 2011 Posted July 13, 2011 Looks like Greg/Emma have provided the answer to the original poster, so as tli suggests, suggest this post is finished and someone start the discussion re. assessment in different MIS thread?? It's one I've actually thought about myself, but simply never seem to have the time/energy to do so and deal with the follow up from what I'd probably state there. But it would be based on curiosity into what basic model other systems follow for the definition/storage/analysis of assessment data, as I personally would be surprised if there arn't significantly better models than the SIMS one out there. I mean - having to give a name to a "holder" of a piece of assessment, and that holder is really only linked to the student, and then having to refer to that holder by the name string in any work you do. What I'd expect a decent system to do is allow you to, at definition time, have it associated with the type of course/qualification that the assessment is for, that where performance measures are relevant, have the system know, by that definition, that the grade in question has whatever weighting so that performance measure analysis is simple and handled by the system. Moreover, the system should, by that model, allow an easy top down/drill down model for viewing assessment that is stored in the system i.e. management get a front page where they can click on KS4, then see Y10 & Y11 listed, click on one of those, see all subjects running within that year, click on a subject, see all classes that deliver that subject, see summaries at that level etc etc etc. Go4Schools (albeit an assessment/reporting system rather than a full MIS) is an interesting example of that type of approach. And the model should make ad-hoc reporting easy i.e. "give me all targets for Y10 GCSE Maths" for example. You wouldn't need to know the name of the "holder", as you would know that the holder is a "target" type, and the relationships are such that you'd be able to specify: Year = 10, Course = GCSE Maths. That type of thing. All that criteria is there in SIMS, but you have to mess around with marksheets to relate anything, and it makes ad-hoc reporting by referencing name strings extremely messy and either with poor performance for anything complex or a non starter in the worst cases. I've never understood why the basic model can't be more sophisticated :-)
Sivadam Posted July 13, 2011 Posted July 13, 2011 (edited) The problem is that early in the thread are some statements that I, personally, refute. These statements need to be criticised (both +ve & -ve !!!) so that misunderstandings are cleared up. Moving these comments to different threads and/or closing that part of the discussion can still mean that any misconceptions about any MIS are not lreared up and can even be exacerbated! (Please note that I have tried to be diplomatic in this post - not one of my strong points!) Edited July 13, 2011 by Sivadam
Sivadam Posted July 13, 2011 Posted July 13, 2011 (edited) That is not really a viable solution as the process of copying, and pasting etc needs to be redone if a new child enters the class. It is also a very longwinded process for a Primary school to do, particularly as they will have to repeat it in many marksheets for different subjects and year groups/classes. Our tracking templates also take colour from calculated targets through hidden formula columns. This would not be possible with the suggested solution. Sorry but I responded to your original post where you said that the calculation of the formua would only be done ONCE. You have now changed the criteria of your original 'problem'. Suffice it to say that we all have to deal with new entrants etc. etc. and there are ways in SIMS, and presumably most other MIS systems, that allow you to do this! I do not dispute what other MIS solutins will do but I do dispute those that say SIMS cannot do something when I know that it can! Unfortunately due personal reasons, which cropped up in the past week, I have a great deal of work to do in the next 8 days and so I will not be able to spend as much time on this theme as I would like. Hence, if a I do not respond again it is not because I do not have an answer. I will pick up this thread again after 22nd July, if one wants to post further examples! Edited July 13, 2011 by Sivadam
Banjo Posted July 13, 2011 Posted July 13, 2011 In the battle of AM7 versus Facility Assessment; The issues I've found In a secondary school it is possible to run out of space on the Sims template! (256 or so Aspects - most hidden) No limits with Facility Sims limits the number nested if then else statements - no limits on the number in Facility Facility and Sims can show Exam results in a 'marksheet' in Facility you can edit these, in Sims you can't Import FFT results directly into Sims There are a lot more, and I could do the reverse on what AM7 can do and what Facility can't - it's a case of personal choice, on the whole I tend to prefer AM7.
Sivadam Posted July 13, 2011 Posted July 13, 2011 My issue is not what other MIS systems can or do, but what people are saying that SIMS cannot do. Different systems will obviously have advantages and disadavantages over other systems. I cannot comment on Facility's abilities apart from addressing the issue where others say that Facility can do it it but SIMS cannot! As for the limits on Spreadsheet size - is it really an issue when you can link Marksheets via the Formuae and/or Aspects?
Graham_Cooper Posted July 14, 2011 Posted July 14, 2011 Hello Edugeekers. Phil Neal, well known to many on this forum, has asked me to respond to some of the points raised on this thread. There are many interesting, and in my view balanced, comments about SIMS vs. Facility for assessment. As you would expect, we are bound to think that the SIMS assessment solution delivers more. That said, comments in here do help us reflect on what the Assessment solution we produce offers and ask ourselves if it could do more. Clearly, whilst schools are about many things, in my view they are principally involved in assessment and using this data to drive standards and inform learning through intervention, target setting, class grouping, whatever. We believe that the SIMS solution - that comprises Assessment, Analysis and now includes Discover offers the most comprehensive set of tools to help schools manage their assessment recording, analysis and reporting. But..... they can always be improved. and it seems we could learn some things from and should perhaps comment on the postings in this thread, which I think can be categorised as follows: 1. SIMS Assessment cannot meet the complex assessment tracking system we use, but XYZ software can. If this is true at all then I don't believe it holds for very many schools. The vast majority do this by using assessment tracking and target setting approaches that are rooted in use of prior attainment data from which targets are set and then regular recording of attainment occurs against the target. This latter check gives a suggestion of the progress of the child against a meaningful benchmark. There are many many ways in which schools all decide to 'skin this cat', but I have really yet to see one that cannot be managed in SIMS Assessment, but can be managed in a competitor MIS. Some schools use super-complex approaches in Excel which, frankly, would be difficult to mirror in any other software as they make use of obscure excel formulae - something I comment on in point 3 below 2. SIMS Assessment is too complex to set-up, not flexible enough and too hard to use. On set up, I think @Sivadam has the essence of what I would like to say here already written in one of his previous posts. That is, there is some short term effort required to create your assessment system in SIMS, but there is long term payoff if you think about it before jumping in, and, once built the system can run and run - as it does in many schools I visit. Setting up SIMS Aspects is few peoples favourite task, but by building them with some validation rules around them (Gradesets, Mark ranges etc) the potential for incorrect data entry by teachers is greatly removed and the ability to perform accurate analyses is massively enhanced. Many primary schools are provided with templates containing Aspects, formulae, analyses grids etc by their LA, so they have little or no work to do in setting up assessment tracking systems. We can improve this area and are looking at set-up Wizards and 'bulk create' tools for example. The flexibility point is an interesting one. Assessment Manger starts like Microsoft Word - a blank page. You can create what you want and record data however you like, the ultimate in flexibility. Comprehensive system utilities allow for bulk manipulation of the data when it has been entered. However, some of the comments above are valid. It is true that you cannot have more than 256 columns (time to do a better design!) and the number of If, Then, Else statements is limited. I'm aware of some schools who see this as a limitation, but not many. We'll take a look at that. Ease of use is, I think, related closely to the set-up and flexibility issue. We have recognised that for some time it has been a lot easier to get data into SIMS that extract and analyse it. This was one of the driving themes behind SIMS Discover. The release of Discover has given school managers (and teachers) a tool with which analysis and asking questions of data is straightforward. I have seen teachers with no knowledge of SIMS data interrogate SIMS and look for patterns and stories in the data. We hope and expect that in the future for assessment, most teachers will involve themselves with the SIMS Marksheet and the Discover tool, both of which are reasonably easy and intuitive to use. Clearly, there will always be an assessment or curriculum coordinator behind the scenes who does the set-up and, as I mentioned above, we need to look at how we make their job as easy as possible. 3. With SIMS Assessment I have to do most of my data analysis in Excel SIMS Assessment is not trying to compete with Excel. Right from the start we designed Assessment to be tightly integrated with Excel - through either the 'one click' export of a marksheet, to the two import from excel routines that allow matched and un-matched data to be imported easily. There are probably hundreds of formulae in Excel and some assessment and data people want to use them, so we make it easy if you do any data crunching in Excel to get the data out and back into SIMS. All that said, I don't believe that the vast majority of schools NEED to use excel for the main purposes of assessment data management and analysis although I do accept that there will be boundary cases in some schools where they want to run a particular calculation or formulae that SIMS assessment doesn't offer. There are pros and cons to each system, with, in my opinion more pros on the SIMS side. But, rather than create a 'points scoring' list of where I think SIMS scores over Facility (and other systems) I have focussed on some of the general points that are raised in this (now very long) thread about SIMS assessment which I hope help the debate. I have tried to give you as honest an appraisal as possible rather than tell you SIMS is the best and you should forget the rest. You wouldn't believe me anyway. If some of you have not taken a look at SIMS Assessment (or even other parts of SIMS) for a long time then please arrange to do so - as Phil mentions above we have an upcoming event in Birmingham, which we are holding on the morning of Tues 20th September specifically for primary schools. The session is aimed at those schools who are interested in evaluating SIMS as an MIS option and will be held at the Clarendon Suites. It will coincide with our regular user group for the 50+ primary schools already using SIMS in Birmingham; this will give schools the opportunity to meet and network with SIMS users to gain an understanding of how they use SIMS to successfully support school strategy. Birmingham primary schools also told us they keen to explore Assessment and FMS in more detail so, in addition to the morning session, we are holding two specialised sessions on the afternoon of Tues 20th September which will focus on these areas. Both existing SIMS users and non-SIMS users are welcome to stay for these sessions should they want to find out more. Thanks for reading this far - I expect my next post to be a lot shorter! 3
LisaJMarks Posted August 12, 2011 Posted August 12, 2011 going through that costly excercise, would welcome a chat
Beduffshirl Posted August 16, 2011 Posted August 16, 2011 going through that costly excercise, would welcome a chat Lisa - I can help you from a Link2ICT perspective. Have you been to any of our MIS events. Happy to come and visit you. Mark
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