[sims] Schoolcomms or Intouch

[number34]

...Most MIS's will provide this function by messaging within the MIS. However not all staff have the MIS open all the time, where as far more will have open email...

 

PARS has nice option whereby you can send a message to all teachers of a pupil and also select that it is sent as an email as well. Not sure if SIMS does this unless you have Intouch.

[vikpaw]

Impartiality is not the aim here.

We are here to share our personal view and experience, which inherently introduces bias.

 

If you're involved in a product not mentioned here then you're outta luck.

 

This wasn't an open discussion about systems in general and the one product for all approach, but that would make a great thread.

@GREED is probably the most easy going sponsor I know and the first to praise competitor products when appropriate.

 

Tasc does have a lot of features and I recently heard of CHQ which purports to do all that schoolcomms and emerge and many other things do together.

 

Sometimes though I like a dedicated product that does its job well, so long as we don't spend all our time keeping the separate systems in sync.

 

On a side note, in another thread I posted a sims report to email all teachers of a given student. Works a treat here. Can't link as on the app!

 

I think for non emergency situations I would like to see the MIS sync with the inhouse email system which that report does for us. It might even work with office 365 if used via an outlook client.

[Schoolcomms]

I agree to a point. You should be able to get a message to all the teachers of little johnny without having to email all staff (currently happens).

 

Just to clarify - Schoolcomms does have the functionality to e-mail all (or in fact just today's) teachers of a student or group of students.

 

 

If you need any more help with this then give our support team a call and they can talk you through it.

[vikpaw]

Our problem is that, it's a bit of a hassle for staff to use Schoolcomms, even when linked through SIMS, so we don't use that function. Despite having a site licence for multiple users, there are only key users that have access. When single sign-on, or even just same sign-on (as AD) works, this will remove a massive hurdle.

[wardsidjame]

Just done the same exercise and gone for inTouch, a tad pricier but if your planning on staying for a while then you have lower annual costs.

 

The main reasons were and this should be anyone priority, ease of use for staff and tie in to existing data, data retention (how do you keep your data if you leave a cloud supplier, your tied into all of these not just Sims), price, off site availability (you have a portal for emergencies where Sims cannot be accessed), other

 

We have used another supplier for a number of years now and feel intouch is now comparable enough to move in house, its more secure as it isnt a website and staff are so poor with security, at least i can enforce/managed their access inhouse and only accessable from certain machines in school, its also one less place for all your parental data to reside.

 

We are also about to launch slg from our sharepoint farm and this brings a lot together in Sims. Again expensive at the start but cheap ongoing and keeps everything in one place.

 

Makes management much easier than having a pep on the vle, 3rd party messaging system and no tie in between them, add in discover and then there are some very powerful tools.

 

Apps are also part of slg now and the slg site is tablet complient.