le4ne Posted July 13, 2011 Posted July 13, 2011 BECTA is long gone (may it rest in peace), the Education Bill is looming on the horizon, and Ofsted framework changes are afoot... We are at that time of year where we need to renew our SIMS Learning Gateway maintenance contract, and I am being asked from above if it is worth us keeping SLG running. Yes, I agree we can save money on printing reports by having them available online, but those savings do not match the amount Capita desire from us! I started to wonder how many Schools/Colleges are planning on maintaining SIMS Learning Gateway (and other equivalents) now that it is not "expected" for us to provide it. I know that Ofsted will most certainly be looking at the different communication methods used with parents/carers, but there's not really any mention of online reporting, just VLE's. We already use email, text, a VLE, and our website to communicate; we have SIMS.net installed in classrooms for registration purposes; we already meet frequently with the parents/carers of our students; and we do not set homework for students as homework is done during our slightly longer school day. Apart from attendance, report, achievement and behavioural information (which we already communicate to our parents/carers), I'm not sure what else I can add to try and justify the expense of keeping SLG for what parents/carers and our staff will actually get from it. Has anyone else been put in the same situation? Has anyone considered deferring using SIMS Learning Gateway for a period of time? Am I just being jaded? (Forgive my mood but I've had a headache all morning, and it's been a long week already!) Any comments are much appreciated
Sivadam Posted July 13, 2011 Posted July 13, 2011 Your contribution would possibly have been of value at the Capita SIMS SLG Software Consultation Meeting in Huddersfield, yesterday. The Southern meeting is next week! As usual there were not that many that volunteered to attend! Which is a pity as many on here, and in other Forums such as SupportNet, complain about the direction that SIMS/SLG software moves in. Others believe, and often publicly wrongly state, that CRs are not looked at! Yesterday's meeting was originally planned to be 2 half days - one for Schools and one for LAs. As it turned out we could all attend the same meeting, which we voluntarily extended to a full day because of all the discussion that took place!
CAM Posted July 13, 2011 Posted July 13, 2011 It's not the best time to hold such a meeting. Not only do support staff struggle to get time off during term time but anyone working in data will be gasping for free time right now. I doubt anyone can get the time off work to go, even for something work related!
Sivadam Posted July 13, 2011 Posted July 13, 2011 It's not the best time to hold such a meeting. Not only do support staff struggle to get time off during term time but anyone working in data will be gasping for free time right now. I doubt anyone can get the time off work to go, even for something work related! I agree! With 6 school days left I am struggling to get the timetable finished, the groups for next year sorted, the Non-Edi quals input into EO, etc. etc. Just shows how highly, I for one, rate these development meetings!
vikpaw Posted July 13, 2011 Posted July 13, 2011 If you don't renew support / maintenance can you keep it running as is or does it have to stay in synch with sims upgrades? I tht the web parts licence was in perpetuity. We just had our ADP installed. Biggest benefit to us isn't parental reporting but teacher access both in and out of school. No need for the client on desktops would save us hassle. There are alternatives but with our intranet planned to use a lot of Sharepoint it makes sense for sims to fit in.
bossman Posted July 13, 2011 Posted July 13, 2011 @le4ne: Have you though of going with some other developer such as these: TASC Software - excellence in education They charge £1 per student so much cheaper than the SLG and it fully integrates with Sims and they do other packages as well. They are a Capita partner so know all about the Sims. It will still cost but not as much. 1
vikpaw Posted July 14, 2011 Posted July 14, 2011 Found out today that the ADP although not updated often, does have to stay in synch with SIMS, so at some point it would stop working, but you could create accounts manually. Still not sure about the actual sharepoint side. @bossman 's idea is a good one, using TASC.
le4ne Posted July 14, 2011 Author Posted July 14, 2011 Thank you for the replies. TASC does look very interesting. So thanks for the heads up, I'm having a look at it now
Max_Power Posted July 14, 2011 Posted July 14, 2011 A very good topic of conversation. We purchased SLG firstly for staff to gain access to reports offsite and complete them - with a view to offer the online reports and attendance data to parents as and when we felt ready. However with only 50 staff actually using SLG and no access for parents I too am asking the same questions to our SMT. With other means of remote access to the school systems currently being put in place it could make SLG dead in the water if we are not going to offer the facility to parents.
SmithR Posted July 14, 2011 Posted July 14, 2011 Got to agree TASC INSIGHT is excellent and cheap compared to others, we installed it November last year and rolled it out to parents by Jan. View all info from SIMS as well as their own software PARS, links into active directory if you add admission numbers to a employeeID field so it automatically gives students access to their information, links into our Kitchen System NRS, We customised it so it fits in with our school branding. It does so much and if you think it needs a new feature you log a call or feature request and most of the time it implemented within the week.
CyberNerd Posted July 14, 2011 Posted July 14, 2011 There is a SIMS moodle integration that provides online parental reporting here: ZiLink Demo: Login to the site
CAM Posted July 14, 2011 Posted July 14, 2011 @Vikpaw: Even without SLG, if you don't pay maintenance you don't get updates and you won't be able to submit the government census due to the million and one bugs that crop up every time the government change the damned thing.
vikpaw Posted July 16, 2011 Posted July 16, 2011 @Vikpaw: Even without SLG, if you don't pay maintenance you don't get updates and you won't be able to submit the government census due to the million and one bugs that crop up every time the government change the damned thing. I only meant the slg component of maintenance. So no effect on SIMS / census.
Greg Posted July 21, 2011 Posted July 21, 2011 If you don't renew support / maintenance can you keep it running as is or does it have to stay in synch with sims upgrades? I tht the web parts licence was in perpetuity. We just had our ADP installed. Biggest benefit to us isn't parental reporting but teacher access both in and out of school. No need for the client on desktops would save us hassle. There are alternatives but with our intranet planned to use a lot of Sharepoint it makes sense for sims to fit in. Capita only supportSLG in the 2 versions of SIMS previous to the current SLG version so you will have issues at some point. The main problem is when the table structures change in SIMS and an older version of SLG is then calling for something that doesn't exist anymore and won't surface data (this happened in Aug last year)
vikpaw Posted July 21, 2011 Posted July 21, 2011 Capita only supportSLG in the 2 versions of SIMS previous to the current SLG version so you will have issues at some point. The main problem is when the table structures change in SIMS and an older version of SLG is then calling for something that doesn't exist anymore and won't surface data (this happened in Aug last year) If they used SIF or a standard API it should be independent of changes to the db!
CyberNerd Posted July 21, 2011 Posted July 21, 2011 If they used SIF or a standard API it should be independent of changes to the db! The schoolsict ZiLink parent reporting module for Moodle is SIF based
Ketlane Posted July 27, 2011 Posted July 27, 2011 I am coming to this thread from an independent school perspective - we know that all our parents, guardians etc have internet access. The release of info online has been widely supported by parents etc. It's save a shedload of effort on reports and so on; we've presented policies online to fit in with compliance while not making them open to the public. As yet we are both sending out paper copies and e-copies, although we are now meeting some market resistance where parents are refusing paper copies on environmental grounds. My forecast is that it'll be electronic only in 12 or at most 24 months. Where we have families abroad or on the move, online is better by far. Now we don't use SIMS and our system is pretty cost-efficient (SchoolBase) for online services - not sure how the finances work out for SIMS. But of you can avoid the cost of paper, copying/printing, envelopes and postage that's a huge saving (and the time and temper saved in not stuffing zillions of envelopes must be worth a lot too).
Sivadam Posted July 28, 2011 Posted July 28, 2011 A very good topic of conversation. We purchased SLG firstly for staff to gain access to reports offsite and complete them - with a view to offer the online reports and attendance data to parents as and when we felt ready. However with only 50 staff actually using SLG and no access for parents I too am asking the same questions to our SMT. With other means of remote access to the school systems currently being put in place it could make SLG dead in the water if we are not going to offer the facility to parents. And don't forget the most important people - the pupils themselves.....................! Why would a school purchase it and then not use it for Parents and Pupils?
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