RootsSchImp

Interesting, can you run MAT wide reports and look at assessments from different schools side by side?

Hi @Pink_Panda, Is this like a withdrawal, where some of the time the student is with one class, but at other times she joins another? If that's the case then you can do that from student curriculum, what you need to do is click the 'relax' button in class assignments and put her in both classes. Then if you scroll down to the timetable below curriculum assignments and click on the periods showing clashes (the periods where both the classes she's a member of are happening. You then resolve these clashes by saying for each period which class she attends. Note that will not remain just a member of the original class - as she attends at least one lesson with a different class she is, as far as SIMS is concerned, a member of that class and a member of her original one. Hope this helps, Ed

There's a process, Tools, Academic Mgmt, Update Course Memberships This should align courses with students timetabled classes. I would run that first because it might sort you out, but I'm not 100% it'll remove Memberships where no class exists so you might still have to edit your left after AS kids.

Hi @langfordaj, Welcome! Despite their useful sounding name, lookup tables are a total red herring in my opinion. If you're doing a straightforward mapping of ks2 to GCSE (say for e.g. 100-105=5, 106-110=6, 110+=7. Create a template (focus, assessment template). Add a column for data review and select the ks2 scaled score your using. If you've got the Reading and Maths and want the avg add R and M then add a column for data review using formula, f-type MEAN and choose columns you want mean of. Then for a target choose data entry using formula, choose resultset and aspect. F-type Marks to Grade, then adjust the values that act as the threshold for each grade. (This does not affect the entered grade value, once in a 5 will be worth 5 not 100) Good luck! Sims is alright when you get used to it. Pro tip: there's lots of keyboard shorts in AM, N for next, enter to open dialogues etc-learn them, the keys are your friend, mouse your enemy.

Hi @tben2505, I think you've put your finger on the issues here, it's a trade off between lots of work up front (creating aspects and adjusting templates and reports) vs more continuous work (monitoring staff data input). I think the issue comes down to how reliable and data savvy your teachers are, when I think back at some of my stone-meet-blood efforts to get some teachers put in marks, the thought of going back to them to say 'No not letters, numbers!' gives me the willies. But if your staff are generally on the level it should be fine. Have you got lots of formulas in your templates? The changing points scores might mean they have to be adjusted anyway.

Hi @tben2505 - I use 'GCSE Results' because, as you rightly say, it never needs changing, it's also unambiguous to someone else that these are the external ones not a summer data collection and when keying through the add column process, N Enter Tab G Enter N takes me briskly through the add resultset process, which is handy as bespoke results requests come pretty thick and fast in late August.

You mean individual student results? I'd probably do that via SIMS Exams 'Reports| Results| Candidate Statement of Results' Though bear in mind that only prints out results from a single season, so if you have early entries I look in main SIMS - I think there's an option to print exam statements via Reports

The points about connexion speed are really important. There's nothing more annoying than a cloud system (from any provider) where screens take more than a second to load. Definitely try from within school before you buy.

If you're planning on making a move that massive I would recommend looking at moving to a cloud based MIS like Bromcom or Progresso. Its obvs a hassle to train your peeps on a new system but they're significantly cheaper than cloud hosted SIMS so factor in what you could do with the money instead. Full disclosure: I sometimes do work for Bromcom but I'm not on commission and have no financial interest in whether you choose them or not.

Making it a double is the best plan. If you want to relax the one per day rule you do that on the auto screen, by right clicking the block

You can tell Nova that different periods have different lengths. You either do it when exporting the cycle or there's an option in the cycle menu called -timings of the school day- If you've added brek club as a period it will appear. But did you mean visually representing the shorter length with a narrower cell? For that I would explore whether you can edit the template where you print timetables. (I wanna say you can, but it's years since I've hac to)

Nested If Then Else uses grade values so what you want is IF y7engprog = 3 THEN (in this box you need a value, not just a colour, so let's say P colour red) ELSE IF y7engprog = 5 etc At the bottom of the formula box there's an 'also colour this column' selector. If you want y7engprog to be colour coded add it here.

HI @ICTLady, Most of the bad stuff you're worried about won't (shouldn't) happen. You should be fine to change the structure without affecting curriculum assignments as the periods with the assigned lessons won't be changing. As far as SIMS is concerned these reg groups won't have anything to do with the pastoral structure though. You can make the reg group registers record the session mark in Tools| Lesson Monitor Setups. You don't need to timetable three separate groups, you can just timetable in Yr 11 on Nova, then in sims relax the rules when assigning students to put students from yrs 9 and 10 in the class. I'm struggling to see the benefit though, especially as the vertical TGs makes the curriculum assignment a pain - what's the advantage of having the periods in Nova? Is it just so the Tutor Room appears on teachers' timetables? If so my advice would be to use NCCs to put the info on teacher timetables and continue registering via LM as per this year.

True, although always worth bearing in mind that any predictions for individual students at best a very rough guide. FFT estimates (back when the FFT gave single grade estimates) were about twice as likely to be wrong than right.

Just out of interest what type of estimate are you using for Y7? GCSE grade or NC level?

Here are some tips, not an exhaustive list by any stretch but Im sure others will pitch in. 1/ Where possible use aspects for a type of assessment, say Word Decoding, and resultsets for a point in time, say Autumn Year 5. When building templates you can clone one you've made then find and replace resultsets, cutting down building time. 2/ Use categories and a standard naming convention for aspects. When setting up it's not so obvious why you need to do this but it makes maintenance of the system much easier. 3/ Nuetral (non colour coded) data entry marksheets. This is a personal one, lots of people RAG their marksheets but I think if teachers enter marks that turn red, they rethink and you end up w worse accuracy. 4/ Most importantly: have a clear plan for your marksheets before you build them-it's so much easier to get them right first time then to go back makibg tweaks. Good luck with the project!

Have you switched the academic year you're viewing in SIMS? Tools| Course Manager?| Set Academic Year? It may be that when set to the current ac yr you see that year's timings even when looking into the future. If it's not that resending the cycle for next AY shouldn't cause a problem unless you've already allocated students to next year's classes. If you've done that I'd recommend backing those up to Excel before resending.

Nearly. You need to create the room in Nova and SIMS (if it's not in already). Then you need to create a class in Nova, schedule it and add the room. Then after you've sent the timetable to sims you can assign students to the group via Focus| School| Academic Structure...

Both - it has to exist in Nova to be assigned there, but all it is in Nova is a name, say D20. When you send it over to SIMS D20 has to exist as a room so that SIMS says 'sure D20 I know where that is'. It doesn't have to be an actual room of course, could be a bit of the playground, or a beanbag in a corridor, it just needs to be a beanbag with the same code in SIMS and Nova.

Make sure you give the class a room in NovaT if you're sending it through without a teacher. SIMS doesn't like getting sent orphan classes with no teacher and no room.

If you go for this I would check that you can still export from T4 into sims right off the bat. I wouldnt be surprised if you couldn't, what with T4 being about a decade in the bin. Last thing you want is for this guy to do it in T4 and then have to manually copy it into the twenty first century, especially if, god forbid, his pony gets sick and he can't drive his trap to school.

Spring cleaning assessment manager could be a productive way of reducing the size of your DB. If you've got a bit of outside DB knowledge I'd recommend: 1/ Export to Excel all relevant Assessment Data (this year and last year if we're being realistic) 2/ Run a report of every result in the system to a text file so you can recover anything should you need to. 3/ Delete all results, aspects and templates then build again fresh and clean. Obvs you'll want to sort your RAM issues first as it sounds like this would be impossible with current server performance.

I agree with @vikpaw - you can 'program' yourself to speed this up by creating all the aspects by type rather than by subject. That means typing the subject code, pasting the aspect identifier. Ctrl-S works for saving and that means you can leave the cursor over 'clone' for quickly moving on to the next one. I sympathise as personally I think AwL tracking that requires hundreds of data entry points is unworkable and within a couple of years your SLT will be telling you to scrap the whole lot and do something else, but what you gonna do?

Good luck - just to reiterate I'm not 100% that doing this won't mess with Options so I do recommend backing up your Options groups in Excel first if you can. Lots of sympathies re the model change - how much easier would running a school be without teachers??

I used to make an excel version for HoDs and SLT to review. Timetable| Selection choose everyone. I copied Plan| Teacher Departments to get depts and loads. Then I used paste special amd transpose as it looks nicer if periods are rows not columns. Whjle we're on the subject, if Nova's getting spruced anytime itd be nice to have a built in, good looking master TT with dept, max allocation and load.