Digitised Register

[abbeyToad]

Does anybody know of a school that has digitised their class register system ?

I do not know if teachers are issued with a school tablet, but suspect that many of them do ?

If a register system were digitised, then an email could be sent out automatically to any absentees parents. This saves administration time later on.

Has anybody had any experience with this sort of system, particularly those having transitioned from a paper based system ?

Yes. School Pod. Really good (unless the internet’s down/computers not working!)

Really, which one is that please ?

"Pod" ?

Most school do this now. It's been many a year since I've taken an old fashioned register.

I must be out of the loop.

How is this achieved. I envisioned that a teacher would be given responsibility of a digital tablet. Is there a computer in every classroom now ?

Yes, there is a computer in every classroom. So you work in a school?

No, but will be a parent.

I’ve never worked in a school without a digital register. Why are you asking?

If you are imagining you've come up with some sort of novel business idea, I think you're a few decades late 😅

My partner and I have been thinking about sending out child to a Steiner School. Apparently the workload on teachers is quite overwhelming, so class sizes are an issue.

I was thinking of ways that I streamline my own workflow i.e. digitisation, and just remember back at school when our names used to be ticked from a paper list.

I suppose then that absentee children's parents receive an email now instead of a phone call, and all of that can be automated.

Why were you asking about union activity, then? Were you hoping that Steiner schools would forbid their staff from joining one? Don't you believe that teachers should be able to take collective action to safeguard their conditions of work?

Teachers' excessive workloads have to do with back to back teaching all day in oversized classes, planning lessons, providing feedback on students work, report writing, record keeping, having to cover lessons for absent colleagues, etc, not the simple task of taking register.

I suppose then that absentee children's parents receive an email now instead of a phone call, and all of that can be automated.

Yes. It all already is. Are you the same parent that was also going to help us by coming up with software to arrange setting? At some point, you might need to accept that there’s already quite a lot of expertise in the education sector. We got this.

EllieNBeeb is 100% correct about where workload pressures arise.

Chasing up absences - supposing that parents haven't rung / emailed anyway to explain - is done by the office staff. Teachers (1) don't have a phone on their desk and (2) have to give attention to the pupils in front of them.

I have a paper register, but as @AnInspectorBores says chasing up absence is something office staff do. Wouldn't touch a Steiner school with a barge pole, personally, I recommend having a really careful look at the underlying philosophy and pedagogy (and I am quite a fey hippy type who you might think would like them).

I find it hilarious that you think school registers aren't already digitised, they have been even when I was a child in primary school! Every classroom has a computer these days, many have iPads too.

Also school office staff chase absentees, there isn't time to be phoning every absent child, teachers have to teach. Office staff do all admin stuff like that.

@abbeyToad

My partner and I have been thinking about sending out child to a Steiner School. Apparently the workload on teachers is quite overwhelming, so class sizes are an issue.

I was thinking of ways that I streamline my own workflow i.e. digitisation, and just remember back at school when our names used to be ticked from a paper list.

I suppose then that absentee children's parents receive an email now instead of a phone call, and all of that can be automated.

An email wouldn't be enough. The admin staff in the office must make contact with each parent in order to properly locate each child. An email with no idea if it had been received, acted upon, etc. wouldn't be adequate to meet the school's safeguarding duty.

A non- teacher who reckons they know and can solve all our problems by suggesting what has been happening in schools for 15+ years 😂😂😂😂 Steiner is definitely the school for your family.

I don't know why there has been a flood of hostility in this thread, but it's quite nasty and I don't like it.

I think I'll leave.

In case you’re genuine and still here, the hostility is because the Staffroom is for school staff. It used to regularly get trolled by goady fuckers who didn’t work in schools and basically just wanted to teacher bash, so MN Towers hid the threads from ‘active’ so that we could drink our tea in peace. When people wander in who clearly don’t work in schools, we get quite defensive. Added to that, there’s been a spate of threads recently from someone who clearly knows nothing about schools coming up with ways to make our lives easier, all of which already exist.

I’ve only ever taken registers digitally. I don’t think you will find many schools that don’t have an MIS nowadays. If it’s a business idea then you’ll be unlikely to be able to sell it. MIS software does a lot more than just take registers and schools are unlikely to ditch their MIS for a piece of software that just does registers.

Registers are digitised. The system automatically creates a list of pupils with missing marks (and I run an eye over it just in case of obvious errors like a message on the absence line that hasn’t been recorded) and then a text is sent to all relevant parents.

Checking the registers and recording reasons for absence is an admin job carried out by the office staff this is not part of teacher workload.

If no response is received to the text, then we attempt phone contact.

It's been quite a long time since I took a paper register? Odd thread.