What to Look For in a Good School Management System

In a previous article, we went over the impact technology has had on the educational sector over the last decades. It has brought tremendous value to students as well as educators too, making their lives a lot less stressful. Thankfully, administrators are not left out as they too enjoy some of the goodness of technology.

And that’s a good thing for those administrators who are savvy enough to embrace technology to not just meet the expectations of students and parents but to also ward off competition.

Even though it may not be on the top of your to-do list as a school administrator, the benefits of having a good school management system are far-reaching. Having a system that makes sharing information seamlessly, simplify processes and minimize duplication will undoubtedly save you a lot of manpower and man-hours. And it does certainly make school ‘administration’ a whole lot earlier and better.

Tough to Decide

Like almost everything in tech, there’s a lot of options to choose from as regards a school management solution. And it can be really confusing for someone who has little or no experience in software to decide which one is best fit for purpose.

That’s why we have decided to put this guide together. What to look for when see deciding which School Management System vendor to work with.

Qualities of a Great School Management System

1. Centralized Database:This may seem like a no-brainer that deserves no mention but we have seen a lot of solutions with scattered data everywhere and that’s not ideal. If you have to switch between systems, panels, and windows to find all the information you need for a particular client or purpose, that’s a sign your life has been made harder than it needed to be.
   What you should look for is a solution with a comprehensive student or staff info on a centralized profile page. You want to easily navigate to and retrieve information from a single source of truth on membership, attendance, awards, suspension, detention, medical history, behaviour, extracurricular, etc.
2. Flexibility to Adapt to Changes: We have seen administrators try to shoehorn their processes to conform with how the School Management Software operates. Which is very undesirable. The software shouldn’t dictate to you how to manage your records but rather you dictate to the software how and where to keep your records.
   Better processes, methods, and standards are always being formulated so it’s restrictive to have to adapt to the system. And on the flip side, the system should not suddenly become obsolete simply because there’s an upgrade in standards or methods.
   Always choose a dynamic system and can adapt to inevitable changes in processes, methods, techniques, standards, and demands.
3. Integration With Other Tools: A very important quality of a great school management system to look for is how seamless and compatible it is with other tools. A great system should be able to integrate nicely with other best-of-platform tools that solve other niche requirements such as finance and billing, teaching toolkits, medical services, and so on.
4. Accessibility: This is another important factor to consider. Most solutions would offer you a standalone or a web-based system, or both. Depending on your requirements and your existing infrastructure, there are pros and cons whatever the package that you decide on.
   However, we must point out these major points. The offline versions or standalone are typically desirable when you have challenges with internet connectivity. It looks like a great option if you have the right infrastructure in place and a few persons are expected to handle the operations of the system.
   While the web-based versions would be paramount if you demand accessibility from anywhere and everywhere. This is the best solution if the number of people who can access the system is not restricted.
   Honestly, with the availability of the internet and internet-enabled devices to every nook and cranny, it’s strongly recommended that you choose the online (web-based) versions of most systems.
5. Scalability: Ideally, if you’re going to tap into the benefits of a School Management Software, it’s most likely that you did this when your records are not so much. Perhaps, your student and staff members are in the hundreds and not thousands. Hence, you have few records to input, compile, and process.
   However, we’d naturally expect those numbers to double and triple as the school grows. All of a sudden the numbers increases tenfold.
   If the vendor didn’t design and develop the system with scalability in mind, the system we fail. And the worst-case scenario is that your requirements may be beyond its use case.
   A viable solution for you must be one that can be scaled upwards. This eliminates the risk of having to change vendors mid-flight simply because their solution won’t scale.
6. Ease of Use: Ease of use for any software is like a rule of thumb, especially when it’s not targeted at people who are expected to be technical. A school management system must be easy to use, even for someone who’s less technical. One way to detect or identify a poorly designed solution is how complicated it is for the users.
   An overly complicated solution will ultimately be of little benefit to the users because their productivity will be hampered. A lot more time will be spent figuring out the workings of the software instead of doing work.
7. Consider What’s Useful Feature: We have seen a lot of school management software come equipped with so many features than a school will ever need. That’s not ideal. There’s always a cost associated with everything you include or remove in a technological solution.
   What you need is not the software with the most features no. Instead, look at the solution which solves 100% of your problems and does it well. Hence, the solution which comes with features where 80% to 100% are useful to you is always better than that which you only need 20% of its capabilities.