SiobhanH

Thanks everyone. I think we need to get out there and have aproper look and feel of what's on the market to see what's going to work for us. We really need a laptop that can work as a tablet rather than a tablet trying to be a laptop and it may be that we end up just getting laptops for now. I will look at the 3 and the Dell. Thanks

I don't thnk the budgets been set for it yet as it's a case of finding what's out there, deciding which ones are the best fit and then how much is it going to cost. Obviously school wants to spend as little as poss however this isn't going to be a massive roll out, it'll only be for a select number of staff with a specific need. The surface pro 2 was looked at and somebody was trialling it with lukewarm results. How much better is the 3??

Hi, We've got a few staff interested in replacing their desktop pc with a hybrid laptop/tablet. The only real criteria being that it has a proper docking station with a network connection and ablility to connect to 2 screens and full size keyboard. They need to be able to access all Office applications and do type fairly extensively. Does anyone have any recomendations of ones we could look at that would fit the bill. Thanks

This is a message posted on behalf of the Headteacher. We'd be grateful for any feedback. We are intruducing a new management information system, ISAMS. I would like to know whether any of you employ anyone to manage your information system (iSAMS, SIMS or others) and how much time they spend and what they are paid. Any information about what exactly they do would be most helpful, too. Thanks

Hi, I didn't find a consultant and ended up doing all the research myself. We got various companies in to do demos to see what they could offer and after an initial round took it to a short list of systems. In the end we went with iSAMS as it seemed to be the most flexible system on the market and had very good feedback from the schools we spoke to that had changed to them. We are part way through the implementation of the system now and so far have been pleased with the support and guidance we've had from iSAMS. I hope this helps?

As we are in the process of looking at a new MIS I've been reading any threads on here and am concerned I'm missing something with some of the comments. We've seen Progresso, iSAMS and Aspen and liked all 3. I've seen the issues surrounding Progresso and that is putting a big question mark over them but we did like th elook of iSAMS and have had good reports from some local Independents using it. Am I missing something with it???? Aspen also looks very good even if there aren't many schools using it yet. I wopuld appreciate any feedback from those fo you that know what you're talking about

We also use a lot of paper at the moment but are finding it's not what we need as we have duplicate information accross avrious teams. I hoping the browser based systems may better suited to our requirements.

There are some specific areas within SIMS which won't work for us. For example we need a running record of communication with parents, health workers, internal and external agencies, local authority's, social workers etc. Although there is a communication log it will only work on contacts that have already been added to SIMS and in addition they need to be added to the Family/Home area. So not only is the log clunky to use, it also isn't able to do what is needed. (this has been verified by CAPITA that it won't work). Assessment Manager doesn't work particularly well with the sort of data we need to input - 25 character limit on data - plus we need to break down all levels to very small sub sections. P1 needs to be broken into numerous sub sections as our students make such small progress, hence we use BSquared. SIMS is great for mainstream schools but isn't very flexible for anything outside of that. As we already have SIMS we would be happier if it could do what we want it to as it would save a lot of time, money and effort rather than having to find something else!

We are also using Bsquared as SIMS is to unwieldy to deal with the small breakdowns within P levels and NC levels that we need. We are aware it can be set up in Assessment Manager but don't believe its worth the time and effort when there is software that can do it better. We have a long list of needs I'm afraid hence wanting a consultant to help us.

Hi All, I work at a special needs school and we are reviewing our MIS. We use SIMS at the moment but aren't happy with what it can do. We've had a SIMS Consultant in to go through the system and see if it can do what we want it but it can't. Therefore we're looking for other options. I've seen iSAMS & Progresso demoed (they are coming in to do demo's for Senior Managers in a couple of weeks) but l'd really like to find a consultant who could go through our needs objectively and point us in the right direction and perhaps provide project management for the process. Can anybody help and/or suggest a system I should investigate?? Many Thanks