A big thank you to all 7,930 schools in the Arbor Community who have made this year a great one.

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The post Arbor Wrapped 2024 appeared first on Arbor.

As a school MIS manages data around all aspects of school life, it’s used by lots of different people. By teachers to take the register or log behaviour incidents, the headteacher to see cross-school statistics, and the office staff/data team to analyse information and contact parents. 

At Arbor, we believe that a moving MIS is a real chance to change the way you work for the better – but more on that later…

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What are the benefits of having my school MIS in the cloud?

Over the past five years, more and more schools are moving away from legacy, server-based MIS and are instead choosing to move to a cloud-based MIS. As of October 2023, this number stands at over 9,000 schools. And, according to the latest DfE census data, 3 out of 4 schools who make the switch choose Arbor.

A recent survey of over 1,000 schools by The Key showed that these trends are set to continue:

So what are the benefits of a cloud MIS?

• Having your MIS in the cloud means school staff to work from anywhere. This became pivotal for many schools during the pandemic
• A cloud MIS should help consolidate all core student and staff data, including attainment, progress, behaviour, payments and messages into one system, improving reporting and giving schools a truly holistic view of their organisation
• Our recent report (free to download here) also showed that schools who use Arbor, the UK’s most popular cloud MIS, save time and money every year by moving away from legacy school MIS

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The UK’s most popular cloud MIS for schools

Arbor MIS helps schools of all sizes work better, with intuitive tools designed to make a difference. Chosen by over 5,500 schools and 450 trusts, we’re proud to be the UK’s most popular cloud MIS. 

Given the impact that switching can have on everything from workload, to staff happiness, parental engagement and school collaboration, we believe that choosing the right MIS is a real opportunity to change the way you work for the better.

But just don’t take it from us, hear below from one Assistant Principal sharing his experience after choosing Arbor MIS for his secondary school of over 2,000 students.

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How do I move school MIS?

We know that switching MIS can be a daunting process. If you’re thinking about moving MIS, but aren’t sure where to start, there are a couple of ways you can find out if Arbor is a good fit for your school:

1. Get in touch with us here. We’ll find out more about your school and go through your options.
2. Watch a demo! All our demos are on-demand so you can see Arbor in your own time.

The post What is a school MIS? appeared first on Arbor.

We sat down with eight ex-teachers who chose to make this move to the technology space and asked them how they found the transition, what top tips they’d give to others looking to change career and their experience of working at Arbor.

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What attracted you to make the move to Arbor?

Suzanna: My previous job had been quite focussed on Higher Education and I missed working more closely with schools. I was also very aware of the pain of using legacy software as a teacher and so Arbor’s mission and product are important to me too.

Sue: I wanted to work in a product role that would allow me to use what I knew about working in a primary school to make life better for teachers.

Ana: One thing that attracted me to Arbor was their commitment to employee wellbeing and career development, since joining I can definitely see that this is a genuine priority for the company!

Ceara: I used Arbor in my previous school during my last term there. From this, I noticed the impact on workload this was already making and enjoyed how I could use this system with ease.

Robin: I genuinely loved teaching, it was all I wanted to be when I was little, but I just couldn’t love the impact it had on my family. I found that I was using all my “sparkle”, energy and patience during the school day, and had none left at the end for my own kids! I started to look for something with more flexibility and that would give me more headspace to focus on my family, but still made me feel like I was making an impact and had a purpose. When I read into Arbor, I was so excited because it ticked those boxes, without making me feel like I was starting a completely new career where all my years of experience in education would’ve been wasted.

Ashleigh: I love that they really care about their staff and can offer progression within the company as well as support people with CPD. 

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How did you find the recruitment & onboarding process at Arbor?

Suzanna: It was brilliant – one of the best recruitment experiences I’ve had. Sophie and Santino were great at keeping me in-the-loop throughout the process and it always felt friendly and clear. 

Ana: The recruitment and onboarding process was incredibly efficient and transparent! I was kept in the loop throughout the recruitment and pre-employment process and was seriously impressed with my onboarding experience! My equipment was sent to my home address prior to my start date with everything set up so that I was ready to go!

Ceara: I was very nervous about venturing into the world outside of the classroom but the recruitment and onboarding process at Arbor was so supportive and I really felt heard. All of my worries were supported and any training I needed for the role was provided. It couldn’t have gone any better! 

Juliet: From day one at Arbor, I had such a warm reception and constant support throughout my first few months. I was never made to feel stupid, even when I asked what an acronym stood for a third time…  

Ashleigh: Really informative. I felt that questions that I had could be answered. I first applied for a role and was told about an even better suited role coming soon which showed that I had been listened to and recruiting staff cared about my needs and the opportunities for me to be a successful employee. 

Jamie: Fantastic – there was always someone there to help and guide, as well as point in the right direction to further develop my learning! 

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Do you feel you are still making an impact within your new role at Arbor?

Suzanna: Yes. I often talk with schools about how Arbor has changed the way they work. I’m proud that I can support our customers in making sure they get the most from Arbor, so they can get time back for students and for themselves.

Ana: Absolutely! The data that school staff need to use and analyse is ever increasing, alongside many other parts of their workload! Helping somebody with a task they were really worried about or showing them a more efficient way to do something is something I find incredibly rewarding! 

Sue: Yes! Knowing that the work I do is useful to thousands of schools, and the hundreds of thousands of staff and students (not to mention their parents) still blows my mind.

Juliet: Knowing I work for a social impact company, which prioritises students and staff when developing the product means I don’t have the guilt of leaving the classroom. With poor work-life balance being a huge factor in my quitting teaching, I love knowing that we’re improving this for current teachers with our MIS.

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How do you find working in a fast paced SaaS environment?

Ana: I love that I am still working in a fast paced environment! I really enjoy this aspect of my job and love that I am challenged and learning something new every day! 

Robin: Schools are such fast-paced environments, so this is something that I have been accustomed to, but it is fast paced in a different way, so it can take a bit of getting used to. However there are lots of genuinely helpful wellbeing initiatives within Arbor, and when the whole company has such a “mental health friendly” approach, it really does feed into all aspects of the job. 

Ashleigh: I love the challenge and look forward to learning from others and keeping up to date with changes. It keeps me engaged in my job role, helps me to learn more and provides a healthy amount of challenge to my days.

Jamie: It suits me perfectly! I like to have priorities, and strive to achieve them in the most efficient way possible. 

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What is your top tip for adapting to a hybrid way of working?

Suzanna: When you work remotely, make sure you have clear boundaries between home and work. If you have a dedicated working space, that’s ideal, but even just having a good routine can help. For example, I often go for a walk after work to help decompress from the day. When you’re in the office, try to make the most of the in-person time you have with people.

Ana: My top tip is to separate your work and relaxing space if you can, even if it is just a “zone” of a room! I taught from home during the pandemic but did not have a proper set-up for this and working from home feels totally different now that I do. 

Juliet: Routine routine routine! Switching from a totally inflexible, rigid timetable as a secondary teacher, it was a huge change for me to manage my own time. By planning out my day every morning, I find my WFH days are much more productive, and I cherish the opportunity to go for a long walk every lunch time rather than stand in the school canteen!

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What was the biggest surprise/challenge you have found moving to your new role?

Suzanna: Flexibility. When I first left teaching, the biggest difference was that I mostly chose how to structure my own work for the day. Even with a deadline, I can choose to do big blocks of a particular task or work on a couple of things at once. That’s very different from teaching, when your day is often planned out for you.

Sue: I also continue to be amazed at how much others in the company really value my experiences from the classroom – I’ve been able to offer my perspective on so many different projects (learning packs from The Key, how schools set up, use and share items of IT equipment, dealing with specific situations in a school environment etc.

Ceara: Adapting to new systems and improving my technical knowledge were my biggest challenges but coming from a fast-paced working environment allowed me to be a quick learner and adapt quickly and with ease. The support I received and continue to receive here is excellent! Every day really is like a school day and I am always learning something new and developing my own professional skills. 

Robin: Not feeling bad for asking questions or clarification! Schools can be a little isolating at times in terms of speaking to other adults, as it can feel like nobody has any time. Asking questions during a staff meeting or training often felt like a faux pax! At Arbor, I think I apologised at least 50 times within my first week. This is still something I am working on, but my line manager is so patient with me and is always reassuring me when I need it! 

Juliet: The biggest surprise to me was the regular words of encouragement, recognition and thanks from colleagues. Teaching was often a thankless job, albeit rewarding, whereas I now feel valued for my efforts!

Jamie: The level of trust put in you at every level. It encourages you to repay that faith and belief by working to the best of your ability, day in, day out. 

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Would you recommend a friend to join Arbor?

Suzanna: Absolutely! You’ll have the opportunity to work with interesting people on important projects for a company that really cares about you.

Ana: Absolutely! 

Sue: Yes, definitely! The Arbor team are great colleagues to work with, and I love that the ethos of the whole company is about ensuring schools have the best tools in place to help them focus on the best outcomes for their students.

Ceara: Absolutely – I tell friends/family all of the time what a positive impact Arbor has had as I stepped away from the classroom. They have always been surprised at how many different ways I have used my skills from teaching every single day as an advanced support analyst!

Robin: Without a doubt – I actually already have, multiple times! 

Juliet: 100%! 

Ashleigh: 100%

Jamie: Absolutely… Arbor has transformed my belief and mindset in the working landscape outside of education as I knew it in the past. And for that, I will forever be grateful. 

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Are you a teacher looking for a new career but aren’t sure where to start? We’d love to hear from you – check out our careers page to see which roles we’re hiring for. 

If you enjoyed this article, we have also sat down with the school governors in our team – read it here!

The post Hear from eight ex-teachers on their move to a new career in technology appeared first on Arbor.

The past two years have had an effect on the wellbeing of school staff and students up and down the country. You might have had to adapt to the uncertainty of remote working or take on more work at a moment’s notice due to staff absences in schools.  

Whatever your situation, you’ve probably been going at full tilt, without having the time to step back and focus on your own feelings. We therefore wanted to share ways of understanding and managing some of the difficult emotions you might experiencing. 

How are you feeling?

This period of change might have left you feeling irritable, anxious or down. You may be feeling less confident than usual and having more consistent worries about body image. You might be drinking and eating more, finding it difficult to make decisions and having trouble sleeping. Maybe you’re noticing unpleasant things going on with your body, like skin irritation, muscle ache and headaches. All of the above are symptoms of stress. I’m going to cover how to recognise and manage these symptoms. 

Firstly, it’s important to say that feeling these things is a perfectly normal response to such an abnormal situation. There will be millions of people across the world experiencing similar emotions. Even if you haven’t been personally affected by Coronavirus, you may be worried about you or your loved ones getting infected, or about getting the supplies you need.  You may be concerned about how future restrictions might effect education or how your school is going to make sure students are able to catch-up.  

Uncertainty is one of the most difficult things to face. Not knowing when things will get back to “normal” makes us feel powerless and unsafe. You might be feeling hyper-vigilant; constantly checking the news to feel more in control. The good news? You’re not alone and there are strategies you can use to cope.

Being aware of what is happening to our bodies when we feel in a panicked state can help us to step back and not judge ourselves.

What is stress?

• Stress is how our body responds to external pressures (something that happens to you)
• Stress is triggered by a stressor – this could be when you experience something new or unexpected which makes you feel like you don’t have control 
• Stress triggers a release of cortisol which causes a “flight, fight or freeze” response. An example of “flight” would be if you deny the situation is happening, “fight” if you get angry, and “freeze” if you get depressed and turn inwards 

Is stress bad? 

Sometimes having a stress response is appropriate and helpful, for example, if you’re pushed into a dangerous or uncomfortable situation, it’s good to trust your instincts and avoid it. However, if we constantly experience stress over a long period of time, this pressure can make us feel overwhelmed or unable to cope. This is what we call “chronic” or long-term stress, and it can have an impact on both physical and mental health.

For more info, go to MentalHealth.org

How can we manage stress? 

There are small and meaningful things you can do to lessen the symptoms of stress. Some of these techniques might seem simple and obvious, but if practiced regularly, they can have a huge impact on your stress levels. 

At Arbor, we’ve set up a dedicated wellbeing committee, who have been rolling out lots of different activities, particularly over the last few weeks, that allow colleagues to dedicate time to mental wellbeing together. We’ve had online yoga classes, weekly group mindfulness practice, fun daily challenges and art sessions. We’re also planning to send out seeds to everyone’s home address so we can start a sunflower growing competition! 

Top tips for managing stress

Stay connected – Even if it’s a few phone calls a week, sending a funny video, or doing an organised activity like a quiz, connecting with others can remind us we’re all in this together 

Stay hydrated – You might usually be really good at remembering to drink, but this can easily be forgotten when our normal routines are disrupted. Don’t forget to keep hydrated to at least cut down on unnecessary headaches

Structure your day – Routine helps us feel secure and is a great start to managing stress. It can be as simple as eating lunch at the same time (perhaps with colleagues) or a regular time you connect with your friends 

Take regular breaks and go outside – When you are tasked with taking on more work, it can be easy to allow yourself to work into your breaks. Try and take a moment to yourself where you can, such as with a short evening walk to keep your mind fresh 

Try mindfulness – Now is the time for an open mind (literally!). I’d really recommend trying an app like Headspace, even if only for 5 minutes a day, to allow you to step back when it all becomes too much 

Remember, some days will be better than others and if you manage just a few of these things you are doing really well. My biggest advice is to lower your expectations – if you don’t feel very productive, don’t let it pull you down. When you’re kind to yourself, you’ll allow your best thoughts to flow.

Useful links for managing stress

I’ve put a list together of some resources I think are really helpful, particularly during the challenges we’re facing at the moment:

For coping with the Coronavirus outbreak:

• Advice from Mind if you’re worried about Coronavirus
• How to looking after your mental health while working during the coronavirus outbreak from MentalHealth.org
• Tips from the BBC about how to protect your wellbeing during Coronavirus
• 10 tips to help if you are worried about coronavirus from the NHS
• Guided meditations from Headspace during Coronavirus

General recommendations:

• Top tips for managing stress from the NHS
• 7 Simple Meditation Techniques to Practice at Work (to Boost Productivity) from Inc.
• 10 Minute Mindfulness Practice exercise from MentalHealth.org
• Mindfulness sessions for kids from CosmicKids.com 

Tom, our Partnership Specialist, has some reading recommendations too!

• “Wabi Sabi: Japanese Wisdom for a Perfectly Imperfect Life” by Beth Kempton – lessons in slowing down, reconnecting with nature, and being gentler on yourself
• “Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less” by Greg McKeown – about wanting less so we can regain control of our own choices
• “Take a Moment: Refocus, Recentre and Relax Wherever You Are” by Mind – simple techniques to find calm
• “Self-Care for the Real World: Practical self-care advice for everyday life” by Nadia Narain
• “Notes on a Nervous Planet” by Matt Haig – how to find happiness with the anxieties of modern life

If you have any tips to add to Danielle and Toms’ lists, share them with us on social media using #ArborCommunity or on our Community Forum if you’re an Arbor school.

For anybody who would like to take some time out for themselves or discover other tips for managing stress, you can watch my mindfulness session that took place at ArborFest. Available to watch for free here. We’ve also got plenty of other blogs that can help you with different aspects of wellbeing and mental health in schools during Covid – you can view them all here.  

To find out how to manage and report on the Coronavirus situation in Arbor, you can read our blog, or find practical advice on our Help Centre. If you’re new to Arbor, find out if Arbor MIS is for you with an online demo – get in touch at tellmemore@arbor-education.com, or give us a call on 0208 050 1028. 

The post Top tips for managing stress during constant change appeared first on Arbor.

As students’ circumstances have changed during the pandemic, schools have had to be flexible with their resources, making quick decisions in order to prioritise what’s best for students. In many cases, schools have made vast improvements to the way they work, faster than they would have before. More students now have access to devices at home, staff have gained extra digital skills, and school communities have been brought closer together.

Above all, Covid-19 has brought to light the students who need the most support, and schools now have the opportunity now to put objectives in place that will really help them long term.

What is a school improvement plan?

The School Improvement Plan or School Development Plan (SDP) is the central document in which School Leaders map out their strategic plans for the development of their school. Based around the school’s established values, it sets out the actions and resources needed to achieve priority objectives. It is often shared with Governors and published on the school’s website.

All other key plans, such as staff appraisal objectives and CPD programmes tie back to the SDP. The school’s strategic financial plan will also link closely to the strategic improvement objectives, in order to plan sufficient funding to achieve them. 

Every school’s SDP will look different, but the most important thing about an SDP is that it’s developed based on evidence of where the school is at, and what it can realistically achieve in order to best support its students. It is also a living document that’s reviewed and updated in an ongoing cycle.

How to write an effective school development plan

When you come to write your SDP, there are several resources you can draw on. First, refer to your four-year strategic plan which will provide the foundation of your key aims. Second, return to last year’s plan to assess what you’ve achieved and how your priorities might have changed. Third, your strategic financial plan (usually written in January) will show you where you’ve committed spending, and what still needs to be addressed as part of your four-year plan. 

Next, remember you’ll need to back up each of your objectives with evidence showing why you’ve identified each focus area, and what your actions will achieve. For this, you’ll need to first carry out a school self-evaluation (SSE) which will help you judge your school’s past performance, strengths and areas for improvement. Your SDP should then align with each of the points in your SSE report.  

Check out guidance from the Education Endowment Foundation on how to create school plans this year.  

Step 1: Write a school self-evaluation (SSE) report

The first (and arguably most important) step in creating an effective SDP is to really understand your school’s performance in depth, including the attainment gaps between different student groups and the factors that cause them. You should look at both summative and internal assessment data in order to build a full picture of how students have been doing this year compared to previous years.

Discover how Arbor’s free Insight performance reports could help you prepare your SDP.

In combination with your past performance data, you can also look at data from other sources, such as:

• Centre-assessed GCSE and A Level predictions
• Progress data during lockdown 
• School context and demographic information (e.g numbers of Pupil Premium, Free School Meals and Disadvantaged students) 
• Findings from any surveys to students during lockdown (e.g. how they experienced working from home). This could provide you with some useful qualitative data on the wellbeing of your students. 

Step 2: Challenge your data

Look critically at your performance data before writing up your SSE report. Ask questions like “Why did these trends happen?” and “Are they typical of our school?” These will help to make sure your judgments are not based on any bias or previous assumptions.

The best way to make informed judgments about your school’s performance is to benchmark against schools like you nationally and in your LA (local authority). Arbor Insight reports will help you with this, by showing you:

• What happened last year, and in the last 3 years in your school
• Whether it was typical for your school
• What happened in schools in the UK, your LA and schools like you, and whether this was typical

But you still might not know:

• Why it happened
• Why it’s typical of your school
• How to address the problems and consolidate the successes

You can take two approaches to help answer these questions:

1. The Socratic approach – Think about your data from various angles (e.g. “Do boys underperform in reading in all year groups?”, “How does this affect SEN pupils?”, “Should we look for another reason for this?”) to uncover any hidden assumptions you might have before taking action

2. Ask “why” 5 times – This single, repetitive question is a really useful way to dig deeper into the context behind your results and again, challenge your assumptions

Step 3: Consider the impact of Covid-19

A big focus of most SDPs this year will be how to get students back on track after lockdown. Your Governors will need to understand the impact of partial school closures on students’ learning and wellbeing to help them review your plans for recovery.

To understand the impact of Covid-19 on your students’ attainment, you might have carried out various baseline tests, and compared these results with where students were at before lockdown. Full and broad evidence of students’ prior performance will help you reliably understand what has changed and set the most effective goals for how to get students back on track. 

Think about other areas that have been impacted by the pandemic, such as students’ mental health and wellbeing. Find out how The Mead Academy Trust investigated how students’ vulnerability, educational needs and wellbeing had changed as a result of Covid-19, and the interventions they’re putting in place to support students.

Similarly, hear how Aspirations Academies Trust are banning the terms “catch-up” and “behind”, to focus on positive recovery.

What to include in your SIP

Schools should structure their School Improvement Plans (or School Development Plans) around Ofsted’s four inspection categories:

1. Quality of education
2. Behaviour and attitudes
3. Personal development
4. Leadership and management

Under each category, you should map out your key objectives with actions and targets associated with each of them. A good model to use is SMART (specific, measurable, achievable, realistic and time-framed), which means making clear the associated costs, timescales and resourcing needed to achieve each of your objectives.

Get advice from education advisor, writer and speaker, Mary Myatt on how to carve out time for satisfying work on curriculum improvement. 

Check out these helpful articles in Schools Week about how to improve sectors of your curriculum: Science, Maths, RE.

School Improvement Plan template

If you’re a new Headteacher, it can be really useful to have a look at example SDPs from other schools, particularly those with similar sizes, cohorts, or in your geographical area. 

The Key for School Leaders has some great guidance and resources on creating your SDP, including a school improvement plan (SIP) template and checklists to help you implement and evaluate your SIP. 

Share it for feedback

As you’re writing your plan, it’s important to share your findings, judgments and reasoning with your Governors and staff, so you can work together to perfect it. Governors will especially have an eye on how you plan to close certain high-profile gaps in attainment such as disadvantaged students.

Track the success of your plan

As the school year goes on, the needs of your students may change (the world they live in certainly will!). That’s why your school improvement planning should be done in cycles; with ongoing evaluation throughout the year to help you figure out what’s working. 

If the objectives you set in your SDP are measurable, you’ll know what evidence you need to look at to work out if you’re on track. The most effective way to track the impact of your school improvement initiatives is in your MIS. Systems like Arbor give you a clear, visual view of how your students are doing at school or MAT level across behaviour, attendance and attainment. It’s then easy to problem-solve your student performance and understand the root factors using relevant information such as students’ background and personal circumstances.

This evidence will show you where you might need to tweak the focus of your objectives so they have a more meaningful impact.

Arbor is here to help

Already using Arbor?

Got a question about how to write an effective School Development Plan? Why not ask fellow schools in the Arbor Community of over 1,800 schools? Join the online Community forum today.

New to Arbor?

Want to find out how our schools use Arbor to work faster, smarter and collaborate more? Listen to our case studies here.

The post How to write an effective school development plan appeared first on Arbor.

With concerns around the impact of the past year on creating a “covid generation” who have supposedly fallen behind, schools are feeling the pressure to support students to “get back on track”.

But is this the right way of framing the next phase of the pandemic?

The impact of covid-19 on attainment 

For some students, the challenges thrown up by the pandemic and the cycles of lockdown have meant their situation has changed, with many becoming more vulnerable and detached from their learning. For others, the challenging time has exacerbated their existing vulnerabilities.

However, as the 15 schools within the Aspirations Academies Trust have found, the remote learning programme they ran during lockdown was highly effective. Recent assessments have found that the majority of students are where they should be with their learning. What is more of a concern, however, is the impact on their mental health that has suffered from the lengthy time away from school and their friends.

Should we be referring to “lost learning” at all?

We’ve seen a lot of headlines in the media dominated by the terms “catch up”, “lost learning” and “Covid generation”, but many schools are starting to step away from this language, finding it unhelpful in creating the right atmosphere for students to thrive in.

Schools in Aspirations Academies Trust have found that these negative words actually have the effect of reducing students’ self-esteem and giving them the message that they’re the problem and need to change.

Approaches to post-covid recovery

Aspirations Academies Trust are championing new approaches to “catch up”,  by reframing the negative language associated with it and focusing instead on boosting student wellbeing through more creative subjects, extra-curricular clubs, and a Quality First Teaching approach.

Get advice from education advisor, writer and speaker, Mary Myatt, on how to carve out time for satisfying work on the curriculum

Banning “catch-up” language

Since being back at school, Rivers Academy in West London have banned use of any negative language to refer to the “covid generation”, which they’ve found has boosted student happiness. 

Words and phrases such as “catch up”, “what you have missed’’, ‘’you’re behind’’, ‘’we don’t have time to finish the syllabus’’ and “Covid generation’’ were replaced with “Let’s build, strengthen or enhance what we already know”, “map where you are”, “master the skills’’ and “everyone is in the same position”.

The decision was inspired by academic and author Judith E. Glaser who said “words create worlds”.

The Rivers Academy has also seen the benefit of positive language. According to Tim Wormald, the school’s Wellness Lead & Assistant Principal, “We have support zones set up for our pupils where they can come and talk to staff about any concerns they have and they have been quiet. You can see and feel the impact that positive language has had at the academy, it feels settled and the students are happy.’’

Championing the progress made in lockdown

Plugging the gaps in knowledge has started by acknowledging the effectiveness of the remote learning that was put in place. As Tim Wormald explains, “The kids did make progress during lockdown. The key has been identifying gaps in their knowledge not through testing but discussions. It is their evaluation skills that have suffered because you can’t question and discuss online in the same way that you can in class with face-to-face contact with your peers. Tackling the issue has come not through extra lessons but focussing on Quality First Teaching.’’

Executive Principal at Harriers Academy, Alex Pearson, explains that the vast majority of students at Harriers also engaged well with remote learning during lockdown and are now either where they should be or only just behind. In a survey of their parents, 98.5% rated the remote learning and support provided as good or excellent. 

Focusing on wellbeing

Harriers Academy in Banbury also banned the phrase “catch up”, and instead have put the focus on boosting the wellbeing of students and incorporating “the three M’s”: Measuring, Mapping and Mastering, combined with a focus on Quality First Teaching. 

Alex Pearson explains, “Once our students returned, we introduced daily “calm time” with yoga sessions, mindful colouring or simply time to talk. Each class also has a calm zone where children can go if they feel it’s necessary.”

Measuring, mapping and mastering

Alex Pearson explains how they’ve implemented “the three M’s” at Harriers Academy:

• Measuring the attainment levels of our students through teacher assessments and parental feedback
• Mapping where they need to be if they are behind and making sure they are given additional support.
• Mastering the challenges that lie ahead for the students through using a Quality First Teaching approach

‘’We have continued with the curriculum and have ensured the children have exciting topics to keep them motivated and engaged. We have focused on lots of time to play with one another and build precious social interactions with peers.’’ – Alex Pearson, Executive Principal, Harriers Academy

Boosting creative subjects

At Park Academy in West London, the focus since returning to school has been on interactive lessons that engage students, and increasing the number of timetabled hours for creative subjects including music, drama and art. 

Principal Juan Delgado said, “Rather than having extra lessons or asking our students to stay late, the focus has been on increasing their love for learning through lessons that are engaging and interactive. We’ve also focused on increasing their passion for reading to help with closing any attainment gaps and also incorporating little “Do Now” activities in their lessons, so it’s low stakes testing. The overall aim is to make sure our students settle back into school life positively without feeling overwhelmed.’’

Increasing the number of hours devoted to PE, Art, Drama and Music for KS3 per week, has had the effect of boosting the mental health and wellbeing of students at Park Academy. According to Principal Delgado, the benefit is that “although the lessons are practical, the students are using their creativity and imagination”.

The school has also introduced an extra-curricular programme of activities which includes a wide variety of sports, such as football and netball, music, art, technology and STEM. These clubs have proven really popular with the students with numbers increasing throughout the term.

Hear how this secondary school is using Curriculum-Led Financial Planning to address gaps in learning during the pandemic

How Arbor can help

Already using Arbor?

For information on how Arbor can support you manage your post-covid challenges, check out our latest blog The Arbor guide to managing your school during Covid-19.  

New to Arbor?

If you’d like to find out how Arbor MIS could transform the way you work for the better, join our webinar series, which includes live demos, as well as sessions walking you through how we move schools to Arbor and work with you to drive long term impact. Check out what’s coming up and book your spot.

The post What’s the best approach to the catch-up curriculum?  appeared first on Arbor.

Financial benchmarking means comparing your finances with other schools and academies who have similar characteristics and challenges. Areas that schools often compare are their income, expenditure, balance and workforce with either schools of a similar size or within their Local Authority (LA).

Why is financial benchmarking so important for schools?

We’re all aware of the widespread funding shortfalls in the education sector, and it’s definitely a challenging time to be a budget holder in schools and Multi-Academy Trusts (MATs). In recent times especially, schools have had to be even more resourceful with their budgets to adapt to the challenges of Covid-19.

Managing the school budget is a balancing act between lots of different factors, with a high level of scrutiny from Governors, the LA, Ofsted and the DfE. To make the right decisions when planning an effective budget, it’s vital to see how this year’s spend not only compares to previous years, but to other schools too, so you can see what’s working and where you could direct your resources more efficiently. 

Financial benchmarking can also help you identify areas where you could cut back on spending (e.g. building improvement) in order to allocate more resources towards your curriculum initiatives or support for students and staff. This kind of analysis will be useful in shaping your school development plan.

How to benchmark your school’s financial data

First, for financial benchmarking to be most effective, make sure you comparing against schools that are in either the same geographical area as you, are a similar size (in terms of staff and students), have a similar demographic cohort of students (e.g. proportion of FSM, Pupil Premium and EAL), as well as student attainment. This level of comparison gives you the best chance of learning from how these schools are managing their finances. 

Second, when you look at your data, bear in mind some key questions: 

• If your expenditure differs compared to other schools, in what areas?
• In what other areas do you differ that could account for this difference? 
• Is there a similar trend year on year? If not, why not?
• What does the comparison tell you about your differences in approach or spending priorities?
• What can you learn from other schools’ approaches? 

The DfE’s schools financial benchmarking service compares the spending, staffing structures and performance of all schools in England each year. You can identify schools like you, then reach out to them for advice via their websites.

How should you use your data?

Once you’ve looked into your benchmarking data, you should evaluate how this data will help you make the best budgeting decisions. Your Governors will be interested to know how and why your financial approach differs to similar schools, and how you plan to redirect your resources to support better outcomes for students. 

Why not present a benchmarking report to your Governors at the next meeting? Some Management Information Systems (MIS) like Arbor MIS have a benchmarking portal, which allows you to compare your school’s behaviour, attendance, attainment and school context data to national averages at key points in the year. This gives you useful context to support your budgeting decisions.

Financial benchmarking reports from Arbor

At Arbor, we create Financial Benchmarking Reports each year for every school and academy in England. The reports give you an overview of all your income and expenditure over the past three years, with comparisons against national financial results, schools like you and others in your local area.

Arbor Financial Benchmarking reports are visual and easy-to-read PDFs, with helpful commentary and colour-coded stats, giving you reliable evidence needed to drive forward budget planning decisions. Perfect for presenting at Governor meetings.

Simply sign into your free Arbor Insight portal to download your copy of your latest report:

• Schools Financial Benchmarking (SFB) Report – with latest 2019/20 data
• Academies Financial Benchmarking (AFB) Report – with latest 2019/20 data*

*Out soon! Watch this space

Over 10,000 schools and 300 trusts have been using Arbor Insight over the last four years to benchmark their performance, dig deeper into their results and shape school improvement. Arbor Insight helps you focus on what matters, with intelligent dashboards showing your attainment, attendance, behaviour and school context data from the last 5 years. And it’s free!

We update your dashboards every academic year with your latest ASP data from the DfE. As soon as you log in you’ll see your headline performance measures benchmarked against your student groups, national averages and local schools. Click on any measure to uncover which student groups are driving over or underperformance.

Discover more about Arbor MIS

If you’d like to find out how Arbor MIS could transform the way you work for the better, join our webinar series, which includes live demos, as well as sessions walking you through how we move schools to Arbor and work with you to drive long term impact. Check out what’s coming up and book your spot.

The post Your guide to schools’ financial benchmarking appeared first on Arbor.

Mary gave a brilliant talk about how schools can carve out time for satisfying work on the curriculum by focusing on fewer things in greater depth. You can read her talk below – or catch the recording here.

Taking care of ourselves first

You don’t need me to tell you how demanding, exhilarating, exciting and exhausting it is in schools, even in normal times (and it has been that to the power of ten recently). So while there’s nothing we can do about what’s happening in the wider world, I think there are some things we do have control over.

I often hear staff in schools complaining that they’re not as far ahead as they’d like to be in certain areas such as curriculum or school improvement. But what I encourage them to recognise is that they only have so much bandwidth. Sometimes we must accept how things are and not beat ourselves up.

On flights when they give out the health and safety instructions, they say that in the case of an emergency, if we’re travelling with someone vulnerable or a young child, we must put our own masks on first. Why is that? Because we can’t look after other people unless we’re safe and sound ourselves.

Greg McKeown talks about rest as a responsibility. It’s not a luxury. It’s really important, for example, that we eat proper food on a regular basis, that we get a bit of fresh air every day and that we go to bed at a reasonable time.

The disciplined pursuit of less

Trying to do everything is a problem for us as a sector. We want the best for our children and our communities, but we simply can’t do everything. 

A real mantra of Greg McKeown’s work is the need to cut back in order to set clearer prioritie that are likely to make the biggest difference. And in the context of education, priorities need to be framed around a focus on what is likely to make the greatest difference to children’s learning. As McKeown says, if we have too many priorities, we’re simply not going to do anything really well. 

Pareto’s 80/20 rule is also worth remembering. In Italy in the 1890s, Pareto found that 80% of the land was owned by 20% of the population. What has emerged from this insight is that across many sectors, a relatively small amount of input has a disproportionate impact. And this broad 80/20 rule also applies to schools. If we cut out some of the processes and resources we use, for example in the curriculum, that have less impact, we’ll be able to focus on the things that make the greatest difference.  

How do you ensure quality in the curriculum?

There is overwhelming evidence from all quarters, not just my own work, that it’s the quality of the curriculum that makes the greatest difference for the greatest number of children. The quality of the curriculum has certainly gone up the agenda recently  since the addition of the “quality of education” judgement to the latest Ofsted framework in 2019. 

There are eight main things we need to get right when thinking about quality education:

1. Realign priorities

Both my work and Ofsted’s research have found that in some schools, priorities have become distorted. In some primaries, for example, in order for children to do well in their SATs, they are given a diet of SATs in the mistaken belief that that will produce better results. But if you look at the scores for the children who didn’t do so well in the reading papers for 2019, it was because of a lack of vocabulary. So how do we develop children’s vocabulary? Through a broad and balanced curriculum, not just a list of spelling. 

2. Address curriculum misconceptions

I notice some misconceptions around the curriculum, such as focusing on skills and thinking of them as “cross transferable”. Just because a child can evaluate and dissect something really well in geography doesn’t mean to say they can do the same in history if they don’t know any history. We need to think of skills and knowledge as being like conjoined twins; through rich exposure to and engagement with the curriculum, skills develop. 

3. Remember children’s entitlement

It’s also important to consider the idea of entitlement. What I’ve found is that some children who need additional support get so many interventions that they actually miss out on the wider curriculum with their peers. Interventions are important but they need to be bespoke and have impact as quickly as possible, so that children can rejoin their peers. 

4. Be more ambitious

For the first time, the Ofsted framework now has a discussion of ambition. We should be asking to what extent the curriculum is ambitious for all our pupils, regardless of their starting points, and what the children themselves are saying about it. Pupil voice is a strong thread in my research, and I’ve found that at the heart of it, children want more demanding work.

5. High challenge, low threat

According to Daniel Willingham, professor of psychology at the University of Virginia, “human beings are curious, but thinking is hard”. If we make things too easy, then the learning is likely not to be so secure. We should therefore not dumb things down for our children. 

About 18 months ago I was working in a school in London with some students who were identified as high priority but underachieving. They said the only lesson they engaged with was geography because the teacher gave them really difficult, demanding stuff to do, such as articles from National Geographic. The teacher would say “You’re not going to understand it all, but that’s alright.”

When I looked at the results for geography in that school, these students were the highest by a margin. The teacher wasn’t giving those students work that was above their “pay grade” in order to get great results; the great results followed from the students relishing the high challenge that was accompanied by low threat. 

6. Be prepared to be surprised

One of the most worrying results of our current system is the reading deficit. In 2019, over a quarter of our children did not reach the expected standard. Research a few years ago found that only about 30% of children are read to on a daily basis, and in 2018 Teacher Tapp found that only 15% of all children are read to in class every day.

Research from Sussex University found that simply reading challenging, complex novels aloud at a fast pace in each lesson repositions poorer readers as good readers, giving them a more engaged, uninterrupted reading experience over a sustained period. The teachers were actually surprised at what the students achieved. 

7. Underpin learning with high quality texts

When introducing new units over time, we should underpin them with high quality texts. Why? Books contain complex ideas and sentences of greater lexical depth and complexity which enrich children’s vocabulary. Through rich resources we’re able to draw out the important vocabulary we want our children to be fluent in by the end of the unit.

For example, a high quality text to support the Year 6 science unit about the theory of evolution and inheritance could be Sabina Radeva’s “The Origin of Species”. Sabina trained as a scientist and then she retrained as an artist, which gives the book two threads: high quality information and beautiful imagery. 

For more examples of high quality texts to use across the curriculum, see the recording of Mary’s talk here

8. Use meeting time to talk about books

So what should we be cutting in order to find time for these marvellous resources? Firstly, we should think about how we use staff meetings. There are plenty that could be handled in an email or just a brief summary. Instead we should turn our meeting time into opportunities to discuss the books and reading we’re going to do with children. 

Six keys to success

Harvard professor, Rosabeth Moss Kanter talks about the six keys to doing good work in any organisation. I think these are useful when thinking about curriculum work:

1. Show up – Ask, are you bringing your complete self to work? 
2. Speak up – We all have the right to have our voices and ideas heard
3. Look up – Remind yourself why you’re doing this work
4. Team up – Remember that greater outcomes come when we’re in it together
5. Never give up – Even if it doesn’t always feel like you’re succeeding
6. Lift others up – One of the greatest gifts we can give to one another is to encourage them

As a final note, let’s remember that we’re human beings first and we’re professionals second. The young people we work with are human beings first and they’re learners second. 

If you enjoyed Mary’s talk, make sure you download her further reading list to learn more.

Want to learn more about Arbor MIS? 

We’d love to show your school or MAT how Arbor could help you work faster, smarter and collaborate more. Arrange a free demo here, get in touch at tellmemore@arbor-education.com, or call 0208 050 1028. 

The post Back On Track – Fewer Things, Greater Depth with Mary Myatt appeared first on Arbor.

We spoke to Rebecca Pickles, Deputy Headteacher at Beacon Academy, about the successes they’ve experienced since moving to Arbor remotely during the pandemic. Rebecca talks about how Arbor has supported their goals to work more efficiently as a school by giving staff the data they need so they’re not reliant on others. Rebecca says she was surprised how straightforward it was to switch systems remotely, and encourages other schools to be open to changing the ways they’ve been used to doing things in order to improve their working culture.

What motivated Beacon Academy to move to a cloud-based MIS?

We were already partly cloud-based with our previous MIS, but the hosted model was fraught with issues when trying to use it quickly and efficiently. The hosted platform often failed during work and it was slow. Moving to a fully cloud-based MIS means that we can access all the functionality wherever we choose to work that has an internet connection.

Cloud-based data storage assures us that we’re not dependent on hardware in school, backups don’t have to be assured and we can work with Arbor to ensure that we’re securely meeting all legal and security requirements in law. It’s a cleaner system and much easier to manage for all users.

Did you or your staff have any concerns before making the change?

There were no concerns that weren’t easy to address. The only major stumbling block is for those high-level MIS users having to ‘get used to’ a new system. This was something that took some time to work through but concerns around this were easily dealt with and supported by our team at Arbor (a level of support we hadn’t experienced when migrating to our previous MIS!). 

Arbor provided a wealth of information and the migration process was well planned to ensure we were all ready when our site went live. Because the MIS is so easy to navigate, it didn’t take long for people to realise what we’d missed for so long; something intuitive that just does what we want it to do!

Why did you choose Arbor MIS? What did you want to achieve by moving to Arbor?

We were encouraged to try Arbor when we joined our trust (Wellspring Academy Trust). We understood the benefits of being in a group of schools who could support us on our journey and there were lots of very experienced people that could can help us out. 

That being said, Arbor for us was also a journey into working with a company whose ethos and approaches to school support aligned with our working model. From the first meeting we realised that the MIS and the development behind it was invested in improving the functionality and making school data management as efficient and user-friendly as possible. The MIS seemed intuitive, built for school use everyday and was built for power and simplicity! 

Irrespective of whether the trust was part of the system already, the move was motivated primarily by making our day-to-day MIS lives more efficient, paperless and usable by all. Our previous MIS was clunky, difficult to navigate, and setting up day-to-day functions for efficient processes required many hours of work and was not easy to access by all users in the Academy. We needed a change!

How did implementing Arbor go remotely?

The process of implementing Arbor remotely was actually a lot easier than I’d anticipated. I actually think that remote working was a better method as it allowed more people to join in, we could keep recordings for training purposes and it allowed things to happen more quickly i.e. we didn’t have to arrange meetings, rooms, people being on site together etc. I would highly recommend it as a way of going into the migration process.

How is Arbor transforming the way your school works? 

There are a number of benefits that we have seen in the short time we’ve been on board:

• Less time required for me to work through requests; staff can do things by themselves
• Data analysis is simple but powerful. I only see what I need to see and setting up bespoke analysis systems are easy to do with very little support needed
• The support we’ve received has been outstanding. When we need help, we’re told firstly whether it’s possible. This sounds negative but actually it’s a huge positive. We have adapted our working practices to question and justify why we want the MIS to do something specifically and take advice from the team at Arbor before considering the validity of requests. It’s a mindset shift that has encouraged everyone to alter their practices and consider why we do things a certain way with attendance, data etc. If Arbor can do it then it’s usually something straightforward that, with support, we can figure out. If there are limitations then the team is able to work with us for a suitable solution or we have to consider why we need the data or admin task and whether it’s meaningful as an activity. Arbor has made us more solutions-focused to our everyday practice. No more requests for random and meaningless data! This has been a culture shift for some, but it’s a worthwhile journey to go on.
• Every day admin is intuitive, and I need to support very little in the work we do.  The Arbor help centre has been invaluable to support our admin team to achieve everyday tasks without relying on other school staff. There’s very little that can’t be done in a couple of clicks, and the day-to-day tasks are very easy to complete with all the information usually on a handy dashboard!
• Improving efficiency and time management, making users more independent and going paperless are our objectives as we start to develop the MIS. Arbor has definitely supported us to achieve this. I can wholeheartedly say that we have never looked back, nor uttered the dreaded phrase “well our old MIS would have done that”!

How has Arbor helped during Covid-19?

Arbor has been particularly useful for us in the following ways:

• Very quick product developments that have supported with attendance taking and DfE returns. This made our attendance lives a lot easier  
• Communications from the Arbor team about all the updates and support sometimes on a daily basis explaining what the product could do to help us record elements of required data and statutory returns
• Consent for testing logs and recording consent returns for staff and students were developed quickly and before we needed them i.e., we didn’t have to create our own documentation to use whilst waiting for a response from Arbor. Very efficient
• Key worker identification fields were created very quickly
• The team at Arbor has been very attuned to the needs of our school during the pandemic. They have developed and tweaked the existing product to gather data relating to the ever-changing requirements of the Government and supported us in our efforts to track all data points from consent to attendance specific to the pandemic situation. A very impressive and supportive model

What do you hope Arbor will help you achieve in the longer term?

The objective for Beacon Academy was to automate and create efficiency. It was to reduce our environmental impact (particularly around the use of paper communications) and be able to share the system with wider stakeholders to allow for transparency and support in our day-to-day business. This has been evident in its infancy as our new MIS and I’m constantly impressed with different developments and features that I believe will contribute to our overall goals.

We hope that in the long term the power of Arbor for our school will continue to amaze as it has so far. We’ve never looked back and are always surprised and pleased with new product developments and the Arbor Product Roadmap. A real MIS gift that keeps on giving!

Want to find out more?

Discover how Arbor could transform the way you work with a free online demo for your school. Get in touch here, or email tellmemore@arbor-education.com.

The post How Arbor has made our secondary school more solutions-focused appeared first on Arbor.

Since I started my career as a School Data Manager nearly 20 years ago, I’ve seen a lot of EdTech come and go. In some areas there have been impressive advances – Arbor MIS, for example, has analytics features that are light years ahead of anything SIMS could offer. 

Luckily though, Management Information Systems (MIS) haven’t just been improving their in-built analysis tools, the best ones are also opening up secure data feeds to allow you to export your MIS data and analyse and share it exactly how you want to.

What is Power BI?

Arbor users can connect secure, customisable data feeds to visualisation tools including Excel, Google Data Studio or, my favourite, Microsoft Power BI. Power BI is enterprise grade business intelligence (BI) software that lets you combine and analyse data from multiple sources to create interactive dashboards and apps.

Of course, as a busy Data Manager or School Leader, you don’t have bags of free time to learn new software, so I’ve put together five of the top things you can do in Power BI so you can see if it’s for you.

Top 5 ways to use Power BI

1. Customise! (without the pitfalls of Excel)

As a Data Manager, I used to share screenshots of reports with SLT, but I would often get asked lots of basic questions, such as “who is this 20% of Year 9?” I would reply with a static student list that was accurate on that day but would soon be out of date.

You could solve this by using Excel, but this comes with a host of other problems, such as users typing over formulas, changing underlying data and sharing outdated versions.

Microsoft Power BI gives you all the benefits of Excel without the drawbacks. You can combine data from your MIS, online assessment tools and spreadsheets to produce the Key Performance Indicators (KPI) that matter most right now. For example, if you’ve got an initiative around punctuality, you could add the start date onto a graph of lates to see if it made an impact.

2. Focus on what matters

The best MIS systems or analysis tools give you an overview of the big picture while also allowing you to zero-in on the key data points and see the students behind the numbers.

Power BI lets you do just this. You can arrange multiple tables, KPI index cards and charts on a single page, then “drill down” into any of them to see the list of students behind the data. Hovering over a chart will also give you useful context, helping you take the best course of action.

If you spot a problem in a particular year or class group, clicking on that data point will filter the rest of the page by that group’s data. This would allow you to see, for example, if a spike in behaviour incidents within a year group has led to an uptick in exclusions.

3. Take action

Unlike Arbor, many MIS systems don’t allow you to take action directly from your analysis. This means you might be carrying out your analysis and communicating your plans via different channels which can lead to people misinterpreting information and a lack of shared purpose between staff.

Power BI’s web portal gives you a shared online space where your stakeholders can analyse, plan actions and carry out on-going reviews of interventions, all in one place. You can comment on specific pages and tag colleagues to bring data points to their attention.

Alternatively, you can share a dashboard in a Microsoft Teams chat so that a group of staff who are working towards a specific school improvement goal could use live data to inform their efforts.

4. Empower SLT to explore data themselves

Not everybody can work with a big table of unstructured data. But when you turn raw records into visuals, you might inadvertently present the problem in a biased way. For example, if your school has seen a spike in behaviour incidents, breaking the data down by either year group, subject or time of day might imply one of these factors is behind it.

Power BI’s “Decomposition Tree” is an elegant solution to this problem. This visual allows you to choose from a list of factors that might affect a measure (such as number of negative behaviour incidents). You can change the order and number of break-downs, either choosing a specific category or one that Power BI has calculated to have a large effect. If a line of investigation leads to a dead end, you can remove, rearrange and look at your data in a new way.

You can also cross-highlight; in the example below, where the user has chosen to break the data down by year, subject and Teacher, selecting “Mr M Parting” shows you that his incidents are resolved slightly faster than the overall average but that a far higher proportion of them are negative compared to the school as a whole (1:1 when the overall ratio is 1:4).

5. See your data in new ways

The flexibility of Power BI allows you to explore data from your MIS in different contexts. For example, using the map visual, you can plot your students by their home postcode to see if their location correlates with attendance or punctuality issues. You could also create a heat map showing days of the week and AM/PM sessions to see if particular times in the week see higher or lower attendance.

This is another way you can tailor your data analysis to your top priorities, which is more important than ever during Covid-19. With so much disruption to accountability measures because of missed exams, being able to bring in other data sources into your analysis allows you to stay flexible and self-sufficient when it comes to monitoring your school’s performance. 

Getting started with Microsoft Power BI

The most important thing to remember about Power BI is that it’s a tool not a solution. While licences are cheap at around £20 per year, the platform isn’t pre-programmed to cater to all of your data needs, you need to create your own data model and dashboards. This requires a considerable investment of time, both to learn the program and create the content. 

The good news is there’s a friendly and growing community of school-based BI developers on Twitter, free tutorials on YouTube and a dedicated blog, Power BI for Schools.

Seamless connection between Arbor and Power BI

Arbor gives you sophisticated out-of-the-box dashboards and easy custom reports at school and MAT level, designed to give staff at all levels a shared view of progress.

Arbor has also created a Power BI Connector and five report templates helping you to visualise Arbor data any way you want to.

To find out more, join me for a Power BI masterclass webinar during ArborFest – Arbor’s virtual conference exploring innovative ways of working 18-19th March.

Power BI Masterclass, 18th March, 2pm
Book your free spot 

The post 5 ways School Data Managers are using Microsoft Power BI appeared first on Arbor.