We would like to take this opportunity to wish you a great summer and look forward to working with you in September.

We are delighted to announce that the following schools have joined Scomis this term. We would like to extend a very warm welcome to all staff:

St Bishops CofE Primary - Cornwall
St Merryn School - Cornwall
Trinity CofE Primary - Devon
Gatehouse ACE Academy - Devon
Leedstown Community Primary - Cornwall
Mabe Community Primary - Cornwall
Penrice Academy - Cornwall
Foxhole Learning Academy - Cornwall
St Newlyn East Learning Academy - Cornwall
Constantine Primary - Cornwall

Successful Capita SIMS Accreditation

It is with great pleasure that we confirm that we have yet again secured accreditation from Capita to continue supporting and developing SIMS and FMS products throughout all our schools for the next 2 years.
 
As you know, we require at least 40% of our schools to return the survey, which is quite an undertaking over 700 plus schools.  We achieved 43% survey returns across our 22 Local Authorities with a week to spare so we wish to express our gratitude to all the schools who took the time to complete the survey and leave us such amazing comments.  We also fed back the many comments received regarding the marketing elements of the survey questions to Capita as this was raised at every User Group and via the Helpdesk during the process.
 
The assessor from Capita said the following:
 
"Congratulations to both you and the team; please pass on my thanks to everyone who participated in the accreditation process. I appreciate that significant effort is required and hope that as a team you feel you have benefited from the exercise.  Certainly your schools appreciate the quality of service that you provide."
 
He went on to add:
 
"Your overall scores of 4.75 for Value for Money and 5.18 for Overall Quality indicate you offer Good Value for Money and a Very Good Level of Service. The majority of all scores across both phases are in the Very Good range for which your team should be extremely proud. Please accept Capita's thanks for the quality of service you are offering to schools & we look forward to celebrating the success with you."

The winner of the tablet prize draw for completing the survey was Helen Dinham from Mount Wise Primary School and we will be inviting her and her school to attend the official Presentation Day which will be held in the Winter Term.    

Welcome to the Summer Newsletter.

Please see our website for the Examinations Officers Newsletter, Scomis Examinations Results Day Handbook and CAS KS2 Calculators

The Service Desk will open from 7.00am until 17.00pm on Wednesday 16th August and Wednesday 23rd August.

Are you thinking of becoming an Academy? Are you unsure of how this will affect your school's systems and processes? Perhaps you'd like advice and guidance on how to make the most of this opportunity to have economic, efficient and effective ICT systems in place? What ever your challenge, Scomis can help.

To find out more visit our website

3 Steps to using SIMS for School Improvement
(it won't cost you a penny more and in fact you could even save money!*)

In the present financial climate, there needs to be a focus on value for money when looking at software purchases or subscriptions to services.
 
At Scomis our experience of working in partnership with schools for over thirty years, has taught us that the majority of schools do not make full use of their SIMS software, but often purchase additional third-party products to replicate functionality that is already in SIMS.
 
Click here and we will briefly take you through some key areas in SIMS where our experience demonstrates that many schools could be achieving better value for money.

The latest 'enhancement' to SnapChat has certainly made the news and schools are warning parents that Snapchat's new location-sharing feature could put children at risk.
 
Do you know?
 
Snap Map lets users share their exact location with people on their 'friends' list in real time
If the feature is activated the user can be tracked on the Snap Map
The location sharing feature is very accurate
The location sharing is an 'opt-in feature'
 
The BBC's Newsround programme has produced the following short guide, explaining how to switch off location sharing:

A new data protection regulation is on the horizon. Enforceable from May 25th, the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) significantly changes the rules for how organisations handle personal data.
 
It's the strictest compliance regulation to date, with far tighter controls and significantly higher penalties.

Most delegates attending the most recent Scomis User Group meetings indicated they:

• Didn't know the Data Protection regulations are changing
• Had no idea what this change means for their school
• Had no idea that schools will have to prove they are compliant with GDPR

 
Consider the following questions:

• Who in your school has access to sensitive personal data?
• Are you certain and can you prove that only those who need to access sensitive personal data can access it?
• Are you protecting people's data rights?
• Do you have an awareness of data breaches?
• Is sensitive personal information stored in an unlocked filing cabinet in an unlocked office?

 
Don't worry.........

Scomis is working in partnership with Groupcall who have designed a training course specifically to help schools come to terms with, and prepare for, the compliance challenges of GDPR.
 
These instructor-led, one-day sessions (held at locations in the South West and further afield), will help you understand GDPR, its impact and requirements, the steps you need to take to ensure you are compliant, as well as workshop sessions to help you apply the theory to your own organisation.
 
If you would like to find out more about these training sessions, which are charged at £195 per delegate, please visit https://www.groupcall.com/gdpr-training.

Scomis Training Autumn Term 2017 – Important Reminder and Advance notice!
 
We know you will be very busy with the end of term fast approaching BUT before you take your well-earned break and start the summer holidays, please take a few minutes to review our schedule of courses for the Autumn term.
Training Directory
School Census Training - 14th September 2017 10.30am to 11.30am
School Workforce Census Training - 12th October 2017 10.30am to 11.30am
 
All school census and school workforce census training will be delivered via the Scomis WebTrain Service this year. The advantage of using WebTrain is that you can choose to attend the 'live' session and then return to watch and listen to the recording as often as you need to! You don't have to buy into the full WebTrain Service – please contact Scomis to sign up and for more information.


Did you Know?
 
Scomis has very experienced account managers with a wealth of knowledge to share with you! 

We can train you in your school on a very wide range of subjects including:
SIMS Technical Essentials
Managing a School ICT Support Team
SIMS Staff Performance Workshop
Using SIMS to support School Leadership
Top Ten reasons for giving your teachers access to SIMS in the classroom
For more information on any of the above, please call or email your account manager Scomis@devon.gov.uk or 01392 385300
 
Don't forget you can view our Course Directory at:
https://www.scomis.org/training/
 

The dates for our Autumn term User Groups are as follows so make sure you save the date.

28th November 2017 - North Somerset
29th November 2017 - Portsmouth
30th November 2017 - Oxfordshire
6th December 2017 - Devon Combined
7th December 2017 - Cornwall
12th December 2017 - Virtual User Group

 
Dear Dolores,
 
The Microsoft Remote Desktop app that is available within the app store will allow you to access the Hosted platform.
Full details on how to install and configure can be found at https://faq.scomis.org/kb13251/
 
Grace