Happy New Year!
Make sure your new year remains happy by reading our articles on Ransomware, Online Safety and looking at the resources for Safer Internet Day in order to protect your data and educate your pupils and students.

Is your school's network protected from external attacks?
 
Ransomware is a form of malware which enables criminals to lock computers and files from a remote location. The user is then informed that unlocking the computer/files requires payment of a ransom fee.                                  

• Have you considered your school's Cyber Protection?
• What 'cyber protection' does your school have in place?
• Does your school have a policy in place for managing, maintaining and reviewing cyber security?
• Does your school have an appropriate and up to date strategy in place to ensure the security and integrity of your network and systems?
• Does your school rely on in-house expertise to maintain your firewall?
• Do you have strong back-up procedures for your network and data?

Review the National Education Network's (NEN) guidance for schools:
http://www.nen.gov.uk/images/advice/docs/NEN_Guidance_Note_12_Ransomware.pdf
 
Watch BBC's video on the dangers of Ransomware
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-38123403

Read Scomis information about how to protect your school from Ransomware.

Read an article in The Telegraph about warnings for schools.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/2017/01/06/schools-warned-cyber-scammers-demand-thousands-ransom-headteachers/

Contents
Service Desk Certification
Training and Events
ISO 27001 Audit
SIMS New Option Module
Information for Devon Schools
Safer Internet Day
DfE Hardware savings
Out of hours use of Scomis Services
Dear Grace

During the Certification External audit in October 2016, Scomis Schools achieved an overall score of 3.28, representing a customer-led Service Desk with a 3-star maturity rating.  The SDC programme offers organisations the opportunity to implement improvements, increase service maturity and ultimately create an outstanding experience for both staff and customers alike
 
Carla Thornley (SDI External Assessor) said: "The Scomis 'family' is at the heart of the service operation.  The team is knowledgeable and experienced, and management clearly place an emphasis on staff autonomy, with a strong approach to personal development."
 
You can find out more about this standard here http://www.servicedeskinstitute.com

Scomis provide a variety of training and consultancy services to the professionals in supported schools. These services are delivered in the best way that suits the customer; by face to face on-site, by remote one to one, by joining a Webinar, by signing up for a formally delivered course in a venue near to the school or by attending one of our termly User Group meetings.

Scomis has been delivering the necessary training to professional staff in schools for over 30 years with a high level of satisfaction from customers.  Please click here or visit our website for the current timetable of scheduled courses.
 
If you would like to book a place on any course not listed on the timetable, please contact Scomis@devon.gov.uk and we will schedule to meet demand.
 
Events - User Groups
The Autumn 2016 User Groups took place at Oxford, Portsmouth, North Somerset, Devon and Cornwall.
 
If you would like to view the Agenda or Minutes for the group nearest you please click here where you will also find dates for the Spring Term meetings.  If you would like to attend any of the User Groups in the Summer Term, please contact scomis@devon.gov.uk to book your place.
 
Dates for Summer 2017 User Groups:

9th May 2017 – Portsmouth User Group – The Marriott Hotel, Portsmouth
 
10th May 2017 – Oxfordshire User Group – The Kassam Stadium, Oxford
 
11th May 2017 – North Somerset User Group – Clevedon Hall, North Somerset
 
16th May 2017 – Cornwall User Group – The Royal Showground, Cornwall
 
17th May 2017 – Devon Combined User Group – St Cuthbert's Conference Centre, Buckfastleigh

Scomis passed a 2 day external audit of our Data and Information Management System against the ISO27001:2013 standard and maintained the certification for another year.

The auditor's report stated "The audit team concludes that the organisation has established and maintained its management system in line with the requirements of the standard(s) and demonstrated to the audit team that it has the ability to systematically achieve the requirements for products and or services within the scope of its activities and in accordance with its policy and objectives."

Capita are on schedule to release a new version of Options in time for the Autumn 2017 term. 

This version will have the long awaited feature of making student options available online so that students can make their choices online and choices can be imported into Sims and into the Options module.    

We will be scheduling training courses for those interested in moving to the new version or who will be using Options for the first time.   The current version of Options will continue to be available alongside the new version.

More details can be obtained by request using scomis@devon.gov.uk

Clarification of recent guidance Re: Amendments made to the Education (Pupil Registration)(England) Regulations 2006 requiring all schools to notify the Local Authority when adding or removing pupils from school roll.
 
Further clarification about recent guidance to Devon Schools in respect of the new legislation around Children Missing Education.
 
The guidance stated, that schools should complete School Leaver's Form SL1 (when removing a child's name from the Admissions register) and the School Joiner's Form SJ1 (When adding a pupil's name to the admission register) unless this information is provided using B2B.

B2B is the name given to data transfer between SIMS and the Local Authorities database (ONE) and this normally takes place automatically for all Non Independent Devon schools on a weekly basis without any user input. These SIMS schools do not need to complete these particular forms but should complete the CME1 form where a pupil's destination is not known or where there are safeguarding concerns.
 
Please also remember to complete the destination field in SIMS when taking students off roll as this will prevent the need for the Data team telephoning schools to request this information. Thank you.

Safer Internet Day (SID) is on the 7th February this year.  Read more here.

Scomis has expertise that can help your school to keep children safe online!  Our Online Safety Essentials Service provides your designated safeguarding lead with the latest advice, guidance and learning resources to use in school and with parents.
 
Half termly newsletters, termly webinars and specially focussed user groups give you the most up to date information in order to stay up to date in this fast moving field!
 
A specially created monitoring and reporting software system, Futures Cloud, is also available using cloud technology to provide an easy to use way of identifying potential incidents of concern in pupil's use of school ICT and enable immediate action to be taken to help keep children safe.
 
For more information or an informal discussion about your requirements contact us on 01392 385300

Schools considering buying new tablets, laptops or desktop devices this year could save thousands of pounds by taking advantage of a new deal developed by the DfE and Crown Commercial Services (CCS).

During evenings and weekends we actively monitor our managed services and if you find issues with access, please continue to log a call so that any problems can be investigated.  Aside from Planned Maintenance the service should be available to you.  

For more information and to be able to see the status of our Service Desk and Hosted Application Service, you can sign up for free email notification of planned maintenance and outages at http://status.scomis.org.

The illustration below shows use of our Hosted Application Service over the Christmas Holidays for the past 5 years.

Dear Mr Fiennes
The new General Data Protection Regulations (GDPR) will be implemented in May 2018.  You will need to:

• Know where and how, personal data you hold is being processed;
• Know where the data came from and who you share it with;
• Have efficive policies and procedures in place;

To avoid the risk of non-compliance in 2018 review the 12 Step checklist available on the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) website.
https://ico.org.uk/media/for-organisations/documents/1624219/preparing-for-the-gdpr-12-steps.pdf
 
This is an example of the advice and guidance you will regularly receive if you subscribe to our Online Safety Essentials Service.  For more information click here.

Grace