The government wants school management information systems (MIS) providers to help it “harness the potential” of the real-time data they collect to inform policy decisions.
The Department for Education is calling on the tech companies to take part in a series of trials to feed up-to-date information from schools straight to officials.
Ministers believe the scheme could help heads benchmark their schools with others across the country and contribute to government decision-making much quicker.
Nick Finnemore, an educational technology consultant, believes the move could also improve the “outdated” way “statutory returns are currently handled”.
“In a modern data environment, the government should be able to access the statutory data it needs, when it needs it, rather than relying on periodic, manual submissions.
“[The pilot’s] success will depend entirely on getting all MIS suppliers on board.”
Tender documents show the DfE is planning the pilots will explore how it “can harness the potential of data to provide new and valuable insights” for schools, trusts and councils.
Working with “multiple MIS suppliers”, officials “aim to test the value of increasing data flows” from the systems to “improve the breadth and timeliness of information available”. Each trial will run for up to 12 weeks.
The department believes that having “access to near real-time” figures would enable “policy decisions to be informed more regularly and more effectively by data”.
‘Less time on census returns’
Schools will be able to use the information to “benchmark themselves against other similar establishments nationally”. They could also “feed into department policies much quicker, which will … directly support improved outcomes for pupils”.
Among the data MIS providers collect are figures for attendance, payroll, admissions, behaviour and assessments.
Duncan Baldwin, an education consultant, added that the scheme – if it is rolled out – would “require less time spent in schools on census returns and lead to benchmarking data” provided earlier.
“But whenever MIS providers have to deliver new services there is always the question of who pays. The costs must not be passed on to schools in the form of increased annual charges.”
The government is calling for MIS firms that can provide access to data for either a small group of local authority schools and/or an MAT of more than 20 academies to step forward. The pilots are expected to begin in 2028.
Towards the end of last year, Schools Week also revealed the government is bidding to shield schools from the £200 million MIS turf war by drawing up a new framework through which leaders can purchase edtech.
Officials launched a consultation on how to simplify buying software and reduce the “legal risks” schools face.
It follows a string of costly court fights, involving local authorities and some of England’s biggest academy trusts.
MIS providers still need to invest in making their platforms actually fully functional and reliable for schools, their customers, before being distracted by this idea.
I think before they do that they really need to change their funding documents and update processes so that there are no ambiguities. When we check our data for errors against the latest funding rules using the government’s own checking tool, there are always anomalies and they change on a monthly basis depending on what changes the government have made to the documentation. It’s a pain and requires manual adjustments that the MIS systems do not handle automatically.