Dear Colleagues (16 December 2021)
Following our communication dated 30 November 2021 regarding ESS – Clarity for the future, we stated we would hope to be able to confirm further this week, so here is an update as promised.
Suffolk County Council are not opposed to change and support the development of services that benefit schools in Suffolk. We do however have a responsibility to technically assure services that schools purchase through Suffolk County Council. We also need to consider any implications where these systems integrate with statutory services and be a source of impartial advice. Consequently, we need to ensure that we have completed all due diligence around services, which will then enable us to sign-off on our technical assurance and be able to offer advice to schools.
The timescale being proposed by ESS does not enable us to achieve this and therefore we propose the following:
- Suffolk County Council will work with ESS to arrange, promote, and run a series of stakeholder engagement workshops with all schools impacted by the contractual change. These workshops will enable schools to question ESS directly and for ESS to demonstrate Next Gen services and SIMs connected.
- After these workshops we will survey all participants to obtain their views on the proposed changes. These responses will then enable us to confirm whether schools are happy to progress with the contractual change.
- Parallel to this we will commence a project to technically assure the SIMS connected service for schools in Suffolk. This will include but is not limited to the completion of a DPIA, cloud assurance, assessment of impact on other services. Although committed to doing this, it seems important to not conflate the contractual change with the SIMs connected offering, as this is an additional service that schools can choose to take.
Given the time required to complete the above, we do not believe that we will be able to agree to the new proposal from ESS at this time. However, we are prepared to review that decision prior to the 2023 renewals subject to the satisfactory completion of the above actions.
We will be in touch in the spring term with further information on the stakeholder engagement process.
Dear colleagues (29 November 2021)
We are aware that some of you may have seen on social media or via other MIS providers of the proposed changes from ESS asking schools to sign a 3-year contract directly with themselves, rather than via the LA for the SIMS.net and FMS licences.
We are currently in discussions with ESS to fully understand the new proposal and are working together to try and make an informed decision that ensures our Suffolk schools are still getting best value for money.
At the moment, Suffolk County Council currently have a contract in place with them until 31 March 2025, but as an LA maintained school we ask you continue to renew via us on a yearly basis.
We will be in contact as soon as we can with further details. Kindest Regards, Schools IT Team
New service - Suffolk schools bronze cyber security
12 November 2021
Suffolk County Council has launched the first of our new cyber security services for Suffolk Schools. This new service will be provided at no cost for the first 12 months for all schools who purchase a broadband service from Suffolk County Council.
The new service has four security and information management features, which we have grouped together to help protect schools and educate staff. The services included are:
- NCSC CiSP - Cyber advice and forum sign up referral
- NCSC - Early Warning System reports, Webcheck & Mailcheck
- Weekly Cyber News, including latest threats and vulnerabilities
- Information Management training.
You can find full details of this service on the Suffolk schools bronze cyber security page.
Capita's webinar programme
2 June 2020
The Capita SIMS and Capita Reading Cloud Customer Success Team run regular webinar sessions. These cover a range of SIMS, Reading Cloud and education related topics.
Read the latest schedule and how to register or check out previous webinars at support.capitasoftware.com.
To access recordings of previous webinars instantly, you'll need to provide your name and some school details. These will not be shared or used for marketing purposes.