Groupcall Local Authority Newsletter |
Spring 2010 edition:
› Groupcall User Group Meetings 2010
› School emergencies...we’ve got an app for that!
› SIF: What’s new in the world of SIF?
› Xporter Dashboard: Vital information flagged with simple “traffic light” alerts
› Admissions Alert: Automated communication with parents, carers and guardians regarding school admissions
› Messenger: Improve attendance figures and pupil safety with an authority-wide parental messaging solution
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Groupcall Xporter User Group Meetings 2010
It’s becoming a tradition that the summer Xporter User Group Meetings are held in unusual locations.
Those of you who attended last year will remember HMS Belfast in London, & Manchester United FC, and in 2008 it was ½ way up Tower 42 in the City of London, and Tatton Park in Cheshire.
This year we’ve chosen the London Transport Museum in Covent Garden, and the Royal Armouries in Leeds, you’ll be receiving a formal invitation shortly, however please keep the following dates free:
› Leeds - 3rd June 2010.
› London – 15th June 2010
For those Xporter customers in the South West region who are not able to join us in London, we are proposing an evening event (to include dinner) on the 5th July, to coincide with the SWGfL annual conference.
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Emerge
School emergencies...we’ve got an app for that!
Groupcall are pleased to announce our new iPhone / iPad / iPod "app". Emerge is a powerful new ‘application’ that allows schools to manage emergencies, fire evacuations, school closures and security incidents remotely via a wide range of Apple mobile communication devices.
Emerge can also store [cache] core data from school MIS (including attendance), which, in unexpected events, will help to ensure student safety and welfare by speeding up the roll-call process and other important emergency tasks. The system will also feature SOS functionality, which will enable rapid contact with emergency services, key personnel and security staff.
Additionally, schools will receive access to a 15-20 minute film that covers the story of the first 30 minutes of a fictional school fire. The film has been made by leading crisis management experts with a team of TV producers and documents the school’s successful execution of their emergency response plan.
Using Groupcall Emerge, schools will also be able to take electronic registration on an iPhone, iPod Touch or iPad. The low cost system is encrypted and secured to standards approved by Becta.
Ahead of its release, we are looking for schools to help us pilot this revolutionary product. If you know of any schools that could help us with this, or should you require any further information regarding the functionality and benefits of Emerge, please contact Stuart Abrahams on 0208 502 7344 or email sabrahams@groupcall.com
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What’s new in the world of SIF?
Over 1,000 SIF agents
At the Spring SIFa UK conference held in London on March 10th & 11th Becta announced that the Groupcall SIF agent has now been procured for more than 1000 schools, mainly within authorities including Birmingham City Council, Warwickshire County Council, and the South West Grid for Learning. The first Welsh trial is underway and two other RBC’s are in the process of starting SIF trials.
Lawrence voted to the SIFa UK board
We are also pleased to announce that Managing Director Lawrence Royston has been voted onto the management board of the SIF Association UK.
Groupcall official Edustructures Agents
Groupcall are now official agents for Edustructures’ products in the UK. This means as well as providing a range of read / write SIF agents for the major MIS systems, we can now offer a total solution including SIFWorks® Enterprise ZIS, Directory Management, ADK & SaaS (SIFWorks® as a Service)
LA-Wide SIF enabled contact system
Last year we launched our authority-wide Alert community contact system. We’re now pleased to add the ability to automatically populate this service via a SIF agent. This results in a ‘cloud based’ hierarchical structured application allowing an authorised user to communicate via text and email, to any individual or group of stakeholders across the authority. Additionally, this will allow your schools to benefit from a safe and secure environment to communicate with its own contacts, whether that is parents, students or staff.
For further information regarding SIF and Groupcall’s SIF agent, please contact Emma Triplett or Stuart Abrahams on 020 8502 7344.
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Xporter Dashboard
Xporter’s new Dashboard features a unique Heartbeat function which monitors your data, and flags up any errors or inconstancies in the information that is being extracted from your schools, all in a simple-to-view traffic light format.
Using Dashboard’s Heartbeat service, instances of authorities not receiving data from a school will be flagged up and can be swiftly resolved – rather than waiting for costly, and often inefficient human intervention at a later date to realise that there is an issue.
Dashboard can also chart relevant data as it is being extracted. For example, you can now view attendance figures across the whole authority in close to real time, or divide schools into groups for like-for-like attendance comparison.
For further information regarding the Xporter Dashboard, please contact Stuart Abrahams or Emma Triplett on 020 8502 7344 alternatively email sabrahams@groupcall.com or etriplett@groupcall.com
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We’re delighted to announce Groupcall’s new Alert system for automated communication with parents, carers & guardians regarding school admissions.
The system is designed to reduce costs by automatically sending reminders when applications should be returned, and letting applicants know when key dates are approaching or have passed.
For further information regarding Admissions Alert, please contact Emma Triplett on 0208 502 7344 or email etriplett@groupcall.com
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Improve attendance figures and pupil safety with an authority-wide parental messaging solution
Manchester City Council recently took the pioneering step of procuring a parental messaging system for all of their schools.
Most schools in Manchester are now using Groupcall Messenger to help ensure the safety of their pupils whilst improving attendance figures. Economies of scale in block procurement have offered significant cost savings over individual schools acquiring the system independently.
Click here to discover why Manchester chose to install our system in all of their schools, contact Emma Triplett on 0208 502 7344 or email etriplett@groupcall.com, to see how an authority-wide deployment of Groupcall Messenger would benefit your schools.
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