TDET ICT Services Brochure

Introduction to ICT Services

Thank you for expressing your interest in the Thomas Deacon Education Trust (TDET) ICT Services.

At TDET, we are dedicated to empowering our community through high-quality education. We understand that innovative and exciting ICT plays a very important role in enabling pupils and staff to achieve their very best.

Our proactive ICT offer consists of three core teams, who work to deliver a continuously improving customer focused service that offers greater reliability and prioritises needs.

To achieve this high level of service, we have implemented new initiatives that have resulted in an improved service, speedier response times and visible improvements.

We regularly review all aspects of our ICT provision. This ensures that if any issues arise, they are identified and resolved before they impact on pupils’ education.

This document will introduce you to our ICT department, give an overview of the services we offer and showcase some of our success stories. We hope it will give you an idea of what you can expect from our service but if you have any further questions, please get in touch.

Introduction to Thomas Deacon Education Trust

TDET is a multi-academy Trust and charitable organisation dedicated to raising educational outcomes across a range of primary and secondary phase schools and academies in the East Midlands.

We are a Trust that unites and empowers like-minded schools to achieve the very best for our pupils and communities. At the heart of our vision is a profound belief that difference is a strength to be valued and celebrated.

TDET academies are connected by a common set of values to empower every pupil, every member of staff, parents and the community through high quality education.

Trust

We are honest and supportive

Diversity

We embrace individual differences

Excellence

We want the very best and never give up on doing what is right

Transformation

We work together to make a positive impact

We work across all key phases of education to provide every child in our communities with the best life chances and high aspirations. All TDET schools strive to give our pupils the very best education possible and we insist upon the highest academic standards.

Our academies work closely together, taking part in real and meaningful collaborations between teachers, pupils and local business leaders. We value our local communities and actively encourage our schools and staff to share best practice to benefit all pupils within each local area.

Through experience, we know that there is no such thing as a one-size-fits-all approach to education. Our academies are individual members of the Trust community and are connected by a common set of values including Trust, Diversity, Excellence and Transformation, but are free to innovate and adapt to the needs of their pupils and the local community.

We firmly believe that the Trust as a whole is more than the sum of its parts. Therefore, all of our schools are equally valued and contribute to the development and direction of the Trust as we grow together.

Meet the team

Just about every function carried out within a school requires the use of ICT. Users depend on ICT being effective and available at all times and without this, and a dedicated ICT team behind the scenes, a school is severely hampered in its abilities to deliver effective education.

Our ICT Services consist of three teams working harmoniously together with the same objective in mind - to deliver effective ICT that enables pupils, schools and staff to achieve their very best.

These teams are Technical Services, Local School ICT Support and Trust-Wide ICT Support

Technical Services

Our Technical Services team work across a number of key areas of service delivery. These include the delivery of large-scale projects, onboarding, and consultancy support.

Local School ICT Support

Local School ICT Support teams are based within schools and led by a Senior Technician acting as the link between the school and ICT. These teams have the responsibility for ensuring that schools have access to the equipment and services they need, when they need them.

Trust-Wide ICT Support

Our Trust-Wide ICT Support teams travel between the academies we work with. The team provide the same service as the local teams but work on a rota-based system with the ability to respond quickly if an issue arises.

Our Services

ICT consultancy

We offer a range of services based on the needs of academies that go far beyond the original specification. Our aim is to ensure that all the academies we work with are maximising their technological investments and getting the most from their equipment for pupils and staff. These services include continuously reviewing, monitoring and assessing existing services, offering support and guidance and providing training for staff.

Cost-effective purchasing

Having access to a number of procurement frameworks allow us to purchase software in bulk, making our services cost-effective and allowing academies to spend more money where it matters. You can be confident that with TDET, you will get the best value for money without compromising on quality.

ICT technical support

We know our users depend on ICT being effective and available at all times. Our skilled technicians offer an effective and supportive help desk. From January to November 2020, 7793 tickets were created on our CRM system and over 25% closed within one hour.

We also offer telephone and remote support, at the desktop. Having this technology available significantly reduces response times and, in most cases, enables the user to resume working with minimal delay.

The data from this technical support service is provided to Principals and used to inform better technology, policies and support, leaving teaching staff and pupils free to achieve their very best.

Monitoring & auditing

We know that the availability of high-quality data is an essential element to providing reliable services.

At TDET, we continuously monitor and evaluate the performance of our systems to ensure that they perform at optimal levels.

All academies that join TDET, and academies that register for our services separately, are subject to an audit by the technical services team into the effectiveness of their existing systems. Our technology review will then proactively indicate and suggest improvements if a need or upgrade is identified.

Less than 1 hour

1 to 4 hours Over 4 hours

Performance of the service desk (Jan – Nov 2020)

Tickets closed within one hour 2015

Tickets closed in one to four hours 1412

Tickets closed over four hours 4366

Our Services

Training & development

TDET believe that training and development of staff plays an important part in delivering a high-quality service to our academies and education for our pupils. We have developed a detailed training plan for staff, ensuring that they keep up to date with the latest technologies and fully understand all legal requirements.

We actively encourage all staff to develop personally through their own learning and are aware that people learn effectively in various ways. As a result, we offer a diverse learning experience, including e-learning, mentoring and coaching, and internal and external training courses.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, we received requests for Microsoft Teams training and swiftly delivered training that enabled staff to communicate with their team, track projects, manage shared files and above all, stay in touch throughout the challenging time.

Updating systems

It is a fact of life that education budget allocations to schools are on a downward trend. We have had significant success, improving performance of computers by upgrading rather than replacing. When combined with newer software the effective life of many computers has been extended by two years, saving expenditure which can be used elsewhere within academies.

This also extends beyond hardware and applies to servers too. By introducing appropriate levels of operating systems, we can ensure a high-quality curriculum and education is accessible for all pupils.

Onboarding

Every school that joins TDET will be incorporated into the Trust Office 365 system in terms of authentication and account management. Our onboarding process is a methodical exercise where we audit current systems and make recommendations based on that report. These systems are fully automated reducing the burden traditionally associated with this task.

O365 training

We are committed to the continued use of Office 365. We know that it has huge potential in reducing teacher workloads and improving pupil outcomes.

We offer training in key areas to ensure that all the academies we work with are aware of what Office 365 can offer and how to access it.

Online safety

Online safety is an integral part of children’s education in today’s ever-increasing digital world and is embedded in their learning at school. A whole school approach to online safety is needed to ensure staff, governors, volunteers and parents keep pupils safe. For this approach to work, a strong and robust ICT service is vital. At TDET, we abide by Government recommendations to guarantee compliance.

When we joined the Thomas Deacon Education Trust, we were a Google school using a free web service developed by Google for use in schools.

Since we joined, TDET have transformed the ICT within our school and we can now share documents and work more effectively with our colleagues across the Trust. The Trust successfully managed our data stored in Google and transferred it over to the Trust Office 365 tenant.

Needless to say, we received excellent training on how to use these new systems efficiently which meant that we could focus on creating a caring and stimulating environment, within which our pupils could grow in confidence.

We have complete trust in TDET ICT Services and in the advice that they are providing.

Case Studies

When we were informed of the school closure on Wednesday 18th March due to COVID-19, we needed pupils to be able to access teaching materials so that they could learn at home over the coming weeks.

We needed a platform that would allow us to see work and offer feedback, as well as enable us to track what work the children were completing and how they were completing it.

Thanks to TDET, we began using Microsoft Teams. Switching to Teams meant we had a fantastic way to communicate with pupils. Teachers were able to create assignments and share videos with additional supporting documents. Our pupils could upload photos of their work, as well as Word documents, PowerPoints and PDFs.

I didn’t think Teams would work for Years 1 and 2. However, how wrong I was! We were able to properly engage with our pupils remotely and help with home learning.