St Helens Borough Council had previously relied on an established education system for 20 years. However, as the software began to age and support by the supplier slowed down, St Helens Borough Council recognised the need for a more advanced solution. They sought a system that would offer better integration with other Children and Young People’s Service (CYPS) systems and facilitate the creation of comprehensive datasets which encompassed more than just education.
Requirements Drafting
Prior to posing an expression of interest to software suppliers, St Helens Borough Council undertook a thorough process to draft an extensive list of key requirements for their desired solutions. They outlined several critical needs they need:
- Must effectively allow us to manage our Statutory LEA services and any returns that must be made on them.
- Effectively allow us to manage our non-statutory LEA, universal and traded services.
- Allow for locally configurable case management of learner support and universal services and other functions.
- Provide a single demographic record with our children’s social care system (LCS) and early help system (EHM), from which education, social care and early help work should be easily accessed, started, and amended. Key information from the other systems should be easily viewable in each system.
- A single data warehouse solution with our children’s social care system (LCS) and early help system (EHM).
- Provide automated data transfer from schools that is agnostic of schools MIS system.
- Include on-going support and development of the solution.
- Must include online Partner portal through which contribution to case work, requests for service and updates can be passed.
- Contain an online Parent portal through which parents can request service or assessments and be provided with updates.
- Incorporate Admissions Portal to facilitate school admissions applications to be submitted by parents.
- Contain GIS integration for use in admissions and transport processing.
- Must include specific and configurable case management for SEND.
- The ability to support processing of home to school transport services.
- Must contain adequate audit trails of system usage.
The comprehensive list of requirements reflects St Helens Borough Council’s commitment to finding a robust, integrated, and user-friendly solution to meet their evolving needs.
Expression of Interest Procurement
In September 2022, St Helens Borough Council released an expression of interest, which received four responses from three unique suppliers and one development company. Upon reviewing the offers they invited the three suppliers to demonstrate their solutions. Through this process St Helens Borough Council identified that only one of the suppliers could meet their specified requirements. This began a pathway which then led to the implementation of Liquidlogic Early Years & Education System Software (EYES) in the Winter of 2023.
Anticipated Benefits
St Helens Borough Council identified several anticipated benefits from their new software procurement of social care and education systems:
Post-Procurement at St Helens Borough Council
Through the procurement process St Helens Borough Council discovered that their internal decision-making was more time-consuming and complex than they initially anticipated. However, they learnt that implementing the solution could significantly alleviate challenges. By clearly defining their requirements, they were able to streamline decision-making, enhance spending efficiency, ultimately saving a considerable amount of time and resources.
Mike Roberts, St Helens Borough Council commented, “Make the Jump, it will happen at some point, we wish that we would have done it earlier.”
Why Choose System C?
Our Education Case Management software is built on a modern, powerful, intuitive, secure, and continually updated platform.
This solution can be integrated with other third-party systems. The modular system means the platform is flexible and unique to every user. Simply choose the education management modules that are best suited to your needs – from admissions and attendance profiling to SEN support, Virtual School, and Free School Meal applications.
Next Steps
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