PaulHarrington

As previously highlighted we delayed transition from Facility to enable us to focus on implementing the identified improvements to both product and process to make the adoption of Progresso for future schools run as smoothly as possible. This includes improvements to training. For those schools that have experience of the transition process and have suggestions for improvement, please contact me directly so that I can discuss these with you. In the meantime, we are continuing to contact those schools affected to arrange the appropriate support.

The migration process for schools coming from another MIS system follows a different process. This includes building all assessment templates, behaviour management models and other configurations from scratch in the system. This has the benefit of starting from scratch without the need for legacy information. In our experience the majority of migration complexity is related to the transfer of legacy data & configurations and this is one of our key areas of focus to enable Facility customers to take advantage of Progresso without losing any of the advanced configurations they have setup in Facility.

I have tried sending a DM to you, perhaps as a brand new member with your first post to this forum you have not found this feature yet. Please let me know which school you are in so I can ensure we direct the right resources to support you.

I understand the frustration of those that are eager to get on and start benefiting from the advanced features of Progresso. The decision to delay transition of schools is not one that has been taken lightly and I would like to take this opportunity to explain why and what this means. We have been running a Pioneer program with a number of early adopter schools to whom we are extremely grateful. During this Pioneer process we have identified a series of improvements to both product and process to make the adoption of Progresso for future schools run as smoothly as possible. Key elements of this improvement program include: • Product enhancements directly requested from live schools • Additional Training courses to provide increased knowledge to end users • Improvements to the data transfer mechanism to allow for modifications to models to take immediate advantage of the advanced functionality in Progresso In order to deliver this program and gather continual feedback from customers we decided to focus on the schools that are currently live and to restart the transition of schools in a phased approach. To any schools that have posted on here and are experiencing difficulties please DM me and I will arrange the appropriate support. We have attempted to contact all schools and are now on the second phase of call backs which will be completed by the end of this week.

I would like to make one small correction to the above quote. There are no plans to discontinue Facility and ePortal in the short to medium term. For anyone that would like more information on Progresso and the plans that Serco Learning have, there is an event on the 12th July in conjunction with Link2ICT and Service Birmingham at which we will be able to answer any specific questions.

I obviously forgot my audience when I made my last post, the database is SQL 2008 R2 and it is being built on .NET technologies. In terms of transition, we have made plans, budgeted and staffed a dedicated development team to continue to support Facility for at least the next five years. The transition tools provide 3 functions during adoption of Progresso. Data Cleanse Data Structures Data Migration Data cleansing will ensure that the information transferred is as accurate as possible and will also highlight any discrepancies within the data. This will provide error reports to users to enable the data to be corrected and can be run multiple times. Data structures include assessments, user defined fields, behaviour structures etc. and will set up these within Progresso to enable the data to be transferred. These will be editable to enable changes to take advantage of the new features and functionality. There is also the opportunity to select which templates you wish to transition, allowing further cleansing of data. Data migration is the final step that will populate Progresso with all relevant staff and learner information. This can be run multiple times for different areas of the system allowing for schools to update information such as attendance without impacting on information that may have been updated within Progresso. The Adoption program that we have in place for existing schools also includes on site training and project management and is provided free of charge. In terms of reporting, we are moving to a completely new reporting engine and this does mean that it is not possible to migrate all reports automatically. Reporting will be fundamentally different in that it will be web based and available to all stakeholders and also interactive rather than static, this will change the concept of reporting and allow richer reporting functionality We recognise that one of the key areas of reporting that concerns our schools are the assessment reports to parents. We have built into the assessment functionality some really exciting and innovative ways of addressing this, without the need for developing reports and look forward to talking to customers about this. The API will be based on standard technology and will be freely available to schools on a non-commercial license. Questions about access to Progresso during an internet outage were also raised and I didn't mention that we are designing a mobile version of Progresso for all major mobile browsers. Finally, I didn't intend the question about internet connectivity to be a side swipe, I would love to hear from this community about how they ensure uninterrupted connection to the internet if their RBC or LA connection is inadequate. As always, feel free to ask more questions.

I am the Head of Product at Serco Learning and would like to correct some of the inaccuracies in this thread and address some of the other valid issues raised. Progresso has a completely new database structure and has been designed from the ground up, with none of the legacy Facility system or architecture. We have been working with a large number of customers and will be able to resolve a number of outstanding issues that schools face and introduce significant new functionality. Focus has been given to the user experience and utilising the rapid developments in technology to provide a powerful yet intuitive system. Progresso will incorporate market leading reporting tools that allow all users to access the information within the system through a web interface. In terms of hosting, we will in the first release be offering a fully hosted version with all the benefits that this will bring. It is disappointing to read about some of your experiences with internet availability and I would like to hear how you manage to maintain access to the invaluable internet research tools that learners require in this technology age. We have engineered Progresso to enable us to provide an in school deployment, but believe that over time more and more schools will opt for a hosted managed service and all the benefits that this brings, including data security. We will be releasing a fully functional API to enable the developer community to create apps to provide added value. This will enable the development of an app, such as Emerge (from Groupcall) that has been requested in this thread. Finally, we do have more than 100 engineers working on the project and are conversant with the Mythical Man Month. This is why we develop prototypes that will be presented to our Pioneer group before committing to development. The Pioneer group are 25 schools that were invited to provide feedback and to be early adopters of the product. News of this program will be on our website and twitter account @Serco_Learning. If any one has further questions, please don't hesitate to ask here or DM me.

Serco Learning are fully comitted to supporting the independent sector. We have just written to all schools detailing some exciting changes to enable us to maintain the highest level of service.

The patch release in July will still be tested against SQL Server 2000. It is the November release onwards that will not be tested against this. Apologies for any confusion that this may have caused. Paul Harrington Product Manager Serco Learning Solutions

Paul I am sorry that you have been told that this only available through consultancy. There is a default KS4 Model, with the necessary reports available. This has the added advantage of working with the Target Tracker functionality in ePortal. If you contact the support desk, someone will arrange for this to be sent to you. Regards Paul

This is actually incorrect. Files (including videos etc) can be attached from any location to a student record, the copy is automatically made in the specified location. Any reports generated from Facility are automatically converted to PDF format and attached to the student record, for example end of year reports can be run for an entire year group and are automatically attached to the students record and visible via the web in ePortal. It is also possible to restrict access to documents to teachers, parents or pupils or any combination of these.

The user guide for document storage is available on the Serco Learning support website http://maxportal.serco.com/sercolearning/ViewFile.aspx?id=390 Regards Paul Harrington