Head’s Blog: Updating Our IT Systems

As you will have seen in my letter last week we are updating our management information system over October Half Term. The new system is called Arbor, and once set up we will send you details on how you can access the parent app.

What is a Management Information System (MIS)?

The MIS stores all student data. The MIS allows us to

monitor attendance, contact parents, manage payments, record rewards and sanctions, produce progress reports, track and analyse student data, take registers and much more. Whilst the MIS operates in the background, it has a big impact on day to day life in schools.

Why are we changing our MIS?

There are two big reasons to change. Firstly, Arbor is a cloud-based platform which means that accessing data is much more straightforward for staff. Secondly, the better functionality of Arbor means there is a significant saving in staff time, which means they can focus on supporting students. There is also a cost reduction as currently we pay for many additional services that will be able to be carried out by Arbor.

Short term pain, long term gain

In the short term changing MIS will inevitably create some disruption. We are doing everything we can behind the scenes to minimise the impact that is felt by students, staff and parents. In the long term, the reduction in costs and the timing savings will provide a significant ongoing benefit to students.

Early finish on Friday

To help smooth the process of data migration we will be closing at 12.15pm on Friday. Hopefully there will not be too much more disruption after that. I suspect some students will not be too upset with the disruption of an early finish just before half term. As the saying goes, every cloud has a silver lining. On that note I hope all students are able to enjoy a restful half term break when we get there.