What do you use to show student data to parents online?

[shadowx]

Just wondering what other schools use to publish student data to parents online?

 

We run SIMS and the school bought into Scholaris (Based on sharepoint, absolute rubbish). A few people from here went to a nearby school to see it in action before we bought it, unfortunately despite the NM pointing it out constantly the other members of staff didn't get the fact that all of the SIMS data (Attendance, grades etc..) was being provided by SLG and not by Scholaris, so we are in a situation where we are not providing online access to attendance data as well as other SIMS data. We have basic stuff like student contact details, parents can login (if they have permission) and view timetables, teachers etc... but Scholaris is more of a VLE than a reporting system.

 

TLDR: We have

Timetables

Student contact details

Teacher/class lists

An assignment management system/VLE

 

We need

Live attendance/late data

Behaviour

Achievement/Attainment

 

 

So what does everyone else use?

 

We are looking at SLG as the most likely solution as it integrates well with Sharepoint, you can take out the attendance webpart and then whack it into any page, so we can put it into our existing Scholaris install.

 

Seeing another thread on here this morning though mentioning TASC Insight which also seems pretty good. The major downside is that it doesnt integrate with sharepoint AFAIK so we would need to setup a new IIS site to host just this information. In theory we could use a webpage viewer part in SP to bring that data in but it's not ideal.

 

Just wondering what else is out there? And reviews/comments on SLG and TASC

[6Foot2]

Parents of students here logon to ePortal to see student data [provided by Serco]

 

We are shortly moving to Progresso (also supplied by Serco) [apparently] I am not looking forward to that.

[Ex-MGSTech]

We use TASC Insight, plugs straight into SIMS

[number34]

We use INSIGHT from TASC and have found it to be excellent. You should be able to get a free trial.

[winng]

We have just dropped the SLG in favour of Bromcom's MCAS www.MyChildAtSchool.com

[glennda]

I implemented SchoolsICT – ZiLink 1.5 – more ZiLink goodness for Moodle with ZiLink Guardian Access! | SchoolsICT which is built on moodle. @penfold_99 is your man.

 

would be totally separate from your Sharepoint.

[shadowx]

Thanks for the replies, when I first looked at moodle a couple of years ago I absolutely hated it, now I am studying with the OU and they use it I am warming to the idea, plus I love open source and what not so I would probably agree that going to moodle then whacking on something similar to your suggestion (AFAIK there are loads of systems based on the ZIF framework, or something like that....) But having foolishly spent thousands on the Scholaris VLE I know they wont want to try that idea. I might just install Moodle somewhere and play with it for 6 months or so and show them a working system, that's if I can find the motivation -.-

 

We have just dropped the SLG in favour of Bromcom's MCAS www.MyChildAtSchool.com

 

Out of interest, what made you drop SLG? MCAS is waiting in a new tab for me so I will have a look at that, cheers.

 

Had a quick look and, unless I am wrong, it seems to be an externally hosted system whereby presumably you have to transmit data "securely" across the web to their servers for display. Sounds to me like just another layer of insecurity ready to be exploited. With kid's data the last thing you need is for it to get into the wrong hands or for the Sun to get hold of it and then hang the school out to dry in the national papers :/

 

 

MGSTech and number43, do you use a VLE at all or have you bought into the TASC VLE system(s)? Have either of you tried/used/seen SLG and if so can you compare it to SLG in any way?

 

Something puts me off the Serco offering, don't know what but I just don't like the site or the name...

[Edu-IT]

We use TASC Insight.

 

www.tascsoftware.co.uk

[number34]

Shadow, we did use Uniservity VLE but have dropped that - I will find out what we do now and let you know. I have had a good look at SLG and did not like the look of it and thought it very expensive. A big selling point of it was that it gave teachers access to SIMS for reports and assessments but we do not allow that here. We run it on our own server and it costs around £1.5k per year for licence and support. We also looked at Bromcom, thought it was the nicest looking but went for Insight because it was easier to configure to show the SIMS data we had. Not sure how it works with other MIS.

[glennda]

Thanks for the replies, when I first looked at moodle a couple of years ago I absolutely hated it, now I am studying with the OU and they use it I am warming to the idea, plus I love open source and what not so I would probably agree that going to moodle then whacking on something similar to your suggestion (AFAIK there are loads of systems based on the ZIF framework, or something like that....) But having foolishly spent thousands on the Scholaris VLE I know they wont want to try that idea. I might just install Moodle somewhere and play with it for 6 months or so and show them a working system, that's if I can find the motivation -.-

 

 

 

Out of interest, what made you drop SLG? MCAS is waiting in a new tab for me so I will have a look at that, cheers.

 

Had a quick look and, unless I am wrong, it seems to be an externally hosted system whereby presumably you have to transmit data "securely" across the web to their servers for display. Sounds to me like just another layer of insecurity ready to be exploited. With kid's data the last thing you need is for it to get into the wrong hands or for the Sun to get hold of it and then hang the school out to dry in the national papers :/

 

 

MGSTech and number43, do you use a VLE at all or have you bought into the TASC VLE system(s)? Have either of you tried/used/seen SLG and if so can you compare it to SLG in any way?

 

Something puts me off the Serco offering, don't know what but I just don't like the site or the name...

 

I setup a moodle site dedicated to Parental reporting and cut out all the stuff todo with classes etc and parents purely use this for Accessing the data from ZiLink, Granted its half the features lost but actually its half the features we didn't want.

[Steven_Cleaver]

We use Insight from Tasc Software has been Excellent key to this;

 

Easy for users to Navigate and looks modern.

Easy to setup and configure how you want just a few check boxes.

Excellent support

Links to SIM's and shows Attendance, Behaviour, Reports and Exams info.

Parents, Staff and Students can all access this.

Very reasonably priced.

[number34]

Shadow, we use moodle with Zilink to pull class and course data from SIMS. Much, much better than our previous Uniservity VLE. Edited November 14, 2012 by number34

[Ex-MGSTech]

TASC Software's INSIGHT isn't a VLE in any form (we have used Studywiz for this for a few years now) but it is an excellent parental portal giving access to the items you wanted and more.

 

Its internally hosted as well so no transmission of data to third parties is required.

If you want more info, ask for Jenny at TASC as she's always been very helpful (She's on here too but mindfull of promoting their products themselves......)

 

Steve