Ditto

Following a post in the BETT thread, with a view to AI use in products, and also a thread about timetabling it got me thinking. ChatGPT has impressed me a lot recently, and I'm initially sceptical of the AI bandwagon. Some of that maybe from a reasonably deep understanding of Text Analytics when I led a team at IBM - it's a challenging topic, but advances in the last decade are staggering. To bring the topic threads together, I'm starting to wonder, by providing all of the input factors that go to pulling a timetable together, like classrooms, teacher subjects, working times, pupil numbers per subject etc. etc., could you see an AI putting together full TT options based on that input, offering several TT options. I think it is entirely achievable - what do others think?

Thanks for that input @Zoom7000 - that insight is fantastic and great you are willing to take feedback. I'm not currently in school sector, but keep a keen eye on things. Your line "Some a little useful, if pricey. Some useless and still pricey!" is probably the most succinct summary of the rush for companies trying to say the are on trend! There's a long way to go with AI integration in so many places. I've been using ChatGPT a lot recently, with legal advice, writing VB code, advising on Excel solutions and a few puzzles. Apart from some of the logic puzzles, it has been outstanding and impresses me enormously. I'd do cross-check it's statements, but take legal advice, it gives me info that would cost a huge amount of money via the legal professions. It has always stood up to cross-checking, but repeatedly says "You should of course take legal advice in many instances". All of this is purely through typing some relatively complex topics, in a purely natural language style. I think a voice solution (if not already available) would be a relatively simple extension. If Edu products can capture 50% of the power of ChatGPT and incorporate them in to added value to whatever product they have, there will be big steps forward.

@ICTDirect_Dave, (other suppliers are available ) what's going on?! All these people buying on amazon! More seriously though, what do you have to meet the situation of a minimal budget but the need to be Windows 11 compatible. On the wider topic of Microsoft strategy, I have a thread running about the e-waste mountain that's coming. Do comment at /forums/windows-11/241272-windows-11-e-waste-mountian-year.html - it would be good to hear from the seller side of how it's impacting business.

I suggest Jerry Dischler was right about it not being a 'hallucination' - but it could have been a 'halloumination'

Majora ('s Mask)

20 years time!? If I'm still breathing, I will be very, very retired!!!

For me there are a couple of big takeaways from the (Lancet) report. Firstly, the article state "... the negative associations found between increasing time spent on phones/social media and worsened mental health and wellbeing do provide evidence on the need to address phone and social media use in adolescents, and school policies should be developed as part a more holistic approach." On the same point "...in moderation (e.g., <2 h per day) screen-based activities can be advantageous for mental health and wellbeing, as well as other associated health and behavioural outcomes (e.g., sleep, physical activity, classroom behaviour, and attainment). At higher levels of use the reverse effect tends to be seen, with increasing time spent on phones and social media associated with decreasing levels of mental wellbeing and higher levels of anxiety, and depression. Poor academic performance, disruptive classroom behaviour, and less time spent in physical activity and sleep are also more likely in adolescents who spend a greater proportion of time on smartphones and social media." In essence, what the article shows to me, is that school policy in isolation is having little effect, a far greater, wider, societal change is required. That would require the social media and technology companies engaging with changing their ways, and I think that is a major challenge. The other point that really struck me, is of all schools approached about the survey, 94.4% did not even bother to reply, not even to decline. I know schools can get bombarded with approaches, but given the explosion of growth in mental health and wellbeing referrals, I would have hoped for better engagement in the subject. Maybe a 5% engagement is in the norm, I don't know. Finally, just to say this is just one study - there's a long way to go with this topic.

Those that do read the Lancet article will note the use of WEMWBS as a primary outcome measure of mental wellbeing. This does not render the report 'nebulous' - it is possible measure objectively something that is subjective -

BBC publish an article casting doubt on mobile phone bans in school suggesting it's not having the impact hoped for https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cy8plvqv60lo It is worth reading the Lancet publication that BBC refer to as it gives a clearer picture whereas the headline might leave you with a slightly skewed understanding - see https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanepe/article/PIIS2666-7762(25)00003-1/fulltext

I'm not currently an Arbor user, or Bromcom, or any other MIS currently, but I take a keen interest in this stuff! It is refreshing to have a look at Arbor's open status reporting, not even hidden behind a registered user account. They appeared, in the main, to be trying to meet their SLA's, but as so often is the case, they are targets that have no penalties for missing, but that's not uncommon. If I recall the documentation correctly, today's incident will result in a Post Incident Report (PIR) to be public available within 5 days. I hope they keep to that commitment and we get more details that led to the cluster restart issues. I note in the last few days there have been several security updates following unauthorised access attempts - I wonder if there is some targeted attacking, but nothing to suggest it's linked to today's outage.

Could it be genuine? I see it has many scam like features, but perhaps the Gov department has just got their data in a muddle and are messaging the wrong people?

https://www.tes.com/jobs/vacancy/it-network-manager-woking-surrey-2165464 I saw this whilst perusing TES jobs. It caught my eye as some years ago I got shortlisted for a role at the College, but came second to an internal candidate - always annoying! Anyway, I was very impressed by the college but thought the Principal was truly outstanding. The only downside I see it's it's a bit light on holidays. Hope it is of interest to someone. Summary: Salary: From £39,575 to £43,444 per annum, depending on experience (inclusive of fringe allowance)Job type: Full Time, PermanentStart date: As soon as possibleApply by: 24 February 2025

Was the weblink spoofed - on first glance, it looks valid?

Wow - the honesty of that ad is refreshing - how many have found your IT role expands after employment under the 'any other duties' contract line. You'd at least think they'd make it TTO!

Who are "We". Just looking to understand if "We" is a primary (unlikely) secondary, all-through, special or other schoo!. Or are you a MAT. If so, what size? With that detail and knowing what "MIS" your school(s) use will better enable a targeted reply.

We're looking at a M365 solution on Teams - basically Transcribe and then Autopilot AI summary. Already we are confused as to permissions and licensing cost, not helped by MS articles being contradictory and test results not following what is on MS articles. One of our SLT have already expressed reservations around content and data protection.. The viewpoint is will control/censure what is documented when it is written down, whereas there is a fear people are less self-controlled in a meeting forum, but then the AI tool then converts to written format. The fact we record a number of meetings as a matter of course (to allow watching by people who could not attend at the time) seems to have not caused the same concern.

Is that median of £144k for CEO's?

Provider replies, "That's fine, but you signed up to a 5 year contract with no get out clause". Come on @mavhc, I wouldn't be surprised if you know how to technically help us here! Funnily enough, I have a thread about a Xerox MFD live at the moment, and after 4 hours, the IT chap couldn't get scan to email working. As a result of this thread, I've realised that what we probably would be better having is scan to Sharepoint and OneDrive. I've already learnt Xerox was a bad move on my line managers move, and if we were able to send it back and replace with something like a Ricoh, that might be a route worth pursuing. So, constructively for the OP, me and anyone else in the same situation, what options are there?

Circling back on the ChatGPT question, I did two things with the original reply. 1. I asked for it to be rewritten in the style of a car dealer. 2. I asked it to give it's view on the original reply being ChatGPT generated. The reply was "The language and structure of the original text are fairly typical of technical explanations generated by AI models like ChatGPT – clear, somewhat verbose, and structured to walk through the reasoning behind a phased approach. The rewritten text, with its analogies and informal tone, is a departure from the typical style, adding personality and a sales-like pitch reminiscent of a car dealer, which is less common in default AI responses unless specifically prompted." I do find the concept of AI systems self-analyzing interesting. "AI navel-gazing" - the concept just amuses me!

Likewise, it does look fun and a fair bit different. Just gotta work out when to watch - it was once said of me, "You need to get out less"!

Bromcom's companies house last full accounts (until end of 2023) submitted last summer to companies house gives some insight as to the cost of litigations. The state under 'Other income' they recieved £1,155,964 related to damages and interest received by the company following a successful legal claim. They go on to say their legal and professional costs amounted to £1,051,299 leaving a surplus £104,665. So that's arguable a return of just under 10%. The other approximately £million is in the legal and professional purses. They split that amount in 2 and half went to "education charities and awareness campaigns for the best practices in public procurement, fair competition, and open systems.". There is more but you can see the details at Full Accounts It's very clear that the owners of Bromcom are passionate about public procurement practices being adhered to. On reflection, maybe we are hard judging the companies rightful legal battles, but the loss of so much money from education sector is what stings. Pursuing their goals via litigation on these figures looks very inefficient and somewhat risky - imagine if they lost the case? *** EDIT - the 'Full Accounts link appears broken, I'll try to resolve. ***

Bought my son an AlphaSync from ebuyer along the lines of your spec just over a year ago. It's a full size case, so quite big. It's worked faultlessly. I'm wary giving unequivocal recommendation - their recent Google Reviews don't look great, but TrustPilot ones are far better - sometimes this review site just make life more complicated! I'd rather hear Edugeek comments on ebuyer - they've been great the few times I've used them over the years. SPEC: AlphaSync Gaming PC - AMD Ryzen 5 5600X 32GB RAM 1TB SSD RTX 4060 WiFi Windows 11 Home. Cost at the time £900. Similar spec looks to be about £100 more now.

It seems to be a legal case based on 'What might have been!'. Perhaps my initial assessment of it take a long time to resolved is wrong - perhaps this should get kicked out of court immediately?

A brief statement from Arbor - https://arbor-education.com/blog-bromcom-v-arbor-legal-dispute/

Wow! This will take a very long time to resolve I guess. The biggest growing market players in a legal spate - that's just plain ugly. There will be no winners, except the legal teams again!