A concerned mother signs up for a new device that tracks her daughter's whereabouts is the overall synopsis of ‘’Arkangel’’ from Black Mirror’s second episode of the fourth season. If you have watched or heard about the show, you would know that it is an outstanding commentary on how overdependence on technology can cause a disastrous impact. Although the plot is far fetching, it does signify our inescapable association with tools and applications for our daily activities.
Companies across sectors and fields are aware of the evolving demands, so they have adopted appropriate systems to facilitate vital functions. For instance, the education sector, one of the leading sectors, strives to keep itself updated with the latest upgrades. In addition, schools and colleges previously followed an antiquated approach to storing student information for the longest time. However, they can switch to smart software solutions to store all student data conveniently.
The last couple of years has been instrumental in the evolution of education technology; therefore, you might have seen an increasing demand for classroom tools. On top of that, online or distance learning has gained momentum and the same status or reputation as traditional in-person learning. Hence, it would be accurate to assume the ever-increasing amalgamation of systems and hi-tech tools to simplify institutional processes.
What is the Student Information Management System?
SIMS (Student Information Management System) is a software that helps institutes to manage and organize all details related to student activities. Moreover, it helps the faculties and institutes' internal team members to keep track of students' progress.
But what is so special about Student Information Management Systems? Why should institutes consider integrating them? Let us have a look.
Ten Reasons Institutes Must Have SIMS (Student Information Management Systems) in 2023 :
1. Smooth Enrollment Process
The administrative department has one of the most challenging jobs in educational institutes; they have to execute multiple tasks simultaneously with precision without any errors. For example, they have to process several admissions and ensure to complete end-of-session formalities with other students. Of course, they have a team of professional staff to handle such tasks, but despite their years of expertise, sometimes it can become overwhelming.
Although they might have standard computerized systems to assist them during rush hours, it falls short in terms of efficiency. Meanwhile, SIMS can help admins optimize the enrollment process by handling queries, guiding students by providing timely guidance, and executing critical admission-related processes.
2. Student Data Management
Summative and formative examinations, class tests, and curricular and co-curricular activities are integral to a student's academic life. Institutes must keep track of specific activities and tasks details through; spreadsheets or excel sheets to manually enter when and what events that took place are no longer relevant. On the contrary, they must choose an advanced system that will help them to keep a record of student activities.
Student Information System is an excellent software that helps admins to manage primary operations like student registration and to track academic progress. Moreover, a single mouse click enables you to organize, analyze, and input student information. Also, the system provides a centralized data management system allowing the stakeholders to track student activities.
3.Student Portal
Remember how students often had to wait till the admin put up notices on the notice board or make announcements via teachers about important events? Fortunately, that has changed over the years, and institutes have opted for a more modern method. Instead of relying on traditional methods, they can use software to help students.
The software comes with in-built student portals that help students to track their schedules, courses, curriculum, fees, invoices, and payment status. Additionally, they can keep track of their daily activities and check schedule changes, classroom discussion topics, and grades.
4. Ensure Academic Improvement
Examinations were the sole indicators that enabled teachers to determine how students performed in the classroom or their potential capabilities. However, now they can undoubtedly implement other techniques; the system aids in attendance management and helps teachers track students’ attendance rates and identify the regular absentees.
At the same time, it helps them evaluate students' performances over a particular period, helping them identify their strengths and weaknesses. Consequently, teachers can take suitable measures to implement pedagogies in response to individual needs; in the long run assessing student profiles at regular intervals enables them to check the progress levels.
5. Institutional Productivity
If your institute adopts an online student management system, it can seamlessly automate the most stressful and time-consuming tasks. For instance, the admin does not have to spend extra time and effort making sure that students' information or details are kept in a safe and secure place.
On the other hand, faculties can take advantage of the tool by accessing the student information on time and improving the student learning experience.
6. Decrease Manual Errors
The administrative staff, faculties, and other stakeholders associated with an institute have specific roles that require solid institutional details. For instance, transactional receipts, committees participating in events, student fee details and academic reports, etc., are the most common items.
Furthermore, an institute is an ever-expanding organization that generates greater data each year; it would be challenging to keep track of evolving data manually without appropriate help. Fortunately, you can significantly decrease any chances of committing errors while documenting details using the student information system.
7. Establish Seamless Parent-Teacher Connection
Parents try to provide their children with the best educational facilities and attempt to be part of their educational journey. However, ineffective systems often become a significant obstacle; students sometimes do not inform their parents about their current academic progress.
Thankfully, institutes can establish a seamless parent-teacher connection with SIMS and keep them updated about the student’s progress level. Therefore, the system not only provides an effective student management mechanism but also helps to initiate a fail-proof communication system by:
- Enabling parents to check their respective student’s grades.
- Keeping track of attendance.
- Sending notifications and reminders about the progress.
8. Highly Secured Data
You might have heard of security breaches occurring in educational institutions, which have led to uncertainty in terms of technological integration. But it is essential to understand that hackers with malicious intent always look to take advantage of confidential data. Therefore, institutes must choose software that provides excellent campus management with in-built high-security features.
Additionally, advanced tools help institutes to protect sensitive student and institute data with encryption and specific protective measures.
9. Streamlined Communication
Institutional success depends upon the concerted efforts of all departments and the timely attainment of academic goals; the lack of synchronous communication is a vital problem that causes several issues related to core operations. SIMS provides an easy-to-use platform to maintain regular communication with all stakeholders.
Moreover, an uninterrupted and streamlined interaction between students, teachers, staff, and institute leaders results in assured success.
10. Establish Networks Easily
A high-performance system helps to organize several bits of data accordingly; you do not have to employ different tools. Moreover, due to its scalability features, the system auto-updates information effortlessly and does not have technical glitches.
Hence, institutes can establish alum networks efficiently and add other information related to cross-institutional ventures and events. As a result, it will enable them to manage data more efficiently without exhausting human resources or effort.
In Conclusion
With each year, the global educational space is evolving to adopt various changes to its content and methodologies. Most of them relate to enriching the teaching and student learning experiences; therefore, institutes must integrate advanced technology like Student Information Management Systems to automate primary operations and bring innovation to their backdated practices.
Author :
Gaurav Somani,
Academic Consultant