eTracker was developed and implemented by a company called VLE Support – a specialist in building technology solutions for educational institutions. It brings together all the data on each student held by the college, from their grades through to attendance records through to disciplinary issues. This delivers better quality of information to teachers and provides them a greater holistic view of individuals or groups of students, allowing them to identify issues and intervene quickly. eTracker will also deliver greater efficiencies - saving time and reducing paperwork.
Jennifer Sims, College Principal at John Ruskin College, commented: “Each student’s page has several percentage bars showing them exactly how well they are doing in relation to their personal goals. It is easy for them and their tutors to identify where they are succeeding and if they are having difficulty with anything, including pastoral achievement. We firmly believe this will help both students and tutors work together to resolve any issues. It is not a one-way system; students can also provide input to their page which will help generate ‘buy-in’.
“We feel that eTracker complements the ethos of our college, which is to help our students achieve their full potential and prepare them for a happy and successful future.”
Access to eTracker is strictly controlled and varies according to each person’s permission level. For example, students can only see information relevant to their personal work, whereas teachers have access greater depth of information on each student and greater breadth of information across groups of students.
Louis Strover, Director of ILT Learning, commented: “Like most colleges today, our ICT systems were quite disparate. Being able to bring all the data from different sources together to a one-stop-shop is a real advantage. VLE Support has been invaluable in helping us to achieve this, tailoring eTracker to suit our needs, and applying their knowledge and experience of similar projects to our college.”
eTracker was implemented over the August bank holiday weekend. Since then, the college has been rolling it out on a team by team basis, starting with the curriculum managers and student support staff. All the teachers will have attended a training session by the end of this term. Feedback has been extremely positive.
