The Educator 5-Star Service Providers Awards

SPECIAL REPORT

2021

SERVICE PROVIDERS Celebrating the companies that have supported Australia’s teachers and students through a turbulent year

CONTENTS

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Feature article .............................................. 2 Methodology ................................................ 3 5-Star Service Providers ............................. 5 Profiles .......................................................... 6 www.theeducatoronline.com

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SPECIAL REPORT SPECIAL REPORT BUSINESS STRATEGY

5-STAR AWARDS 2021: SERVICE PROVIDERS

ENABLING EDUCATION TO THRIVE WHILE COVID-19 has affected schools around the country in different ways, the pandemic has universally reshaped the way education is delivered. Schools have had to adapt, react and hike a steep learning curve over the past two years.

Although a recent global survey by McKinsey found that most teachers believe remote learning is a poor substitute for faceto-face classes, it’s worth acknowledging the colossal effort that has gone into making it possible at all. It’s been achieved not just because of the dedication and hard work

of the schools themselves, but also with the support of the many providers they rely on.

In this report, The Educator celebrates 43 businesses which, through all the trials of on-and-off remote learning, have walked alongside schools, teachers and students to help ease the transition.

All the 5-Star Service Providers – from school uniform suppliers and recruiters to learning management systems providers and software security experts – are giving schools value for money and enabling optimal use of resources, as well as making

THE REMOTE LEARNING PICTURE

Teachers reporting that all students had access to devices (primary and secondary)

49%

Teachers reporting that few (25%) of students had access to devices

1.25%

Teachers reporting reliable internet connections for classes all of the time

10%

Source: University of Melbourne Australian Education Survey

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“With simulations, students can do the experiment themselves. That is very empowering” Simon Crook, CrookED Science transactions as stress-free as possible.

Whether they’re offering online pastoral care tools or personal development programs for teachers, these providers are ensuring the best possible experience in difficult circumstances.

One of this year’s 5-Star Service Providers is CrookED Science, a STEM education consultancy set up in 2015 to help NSW primary teachers navigate the new science syllabus. Founder Simon Crook and his team now assist primary and secondary teachers across the state to deliver hands-on lessons in all STEM subjects.

Science seems like an especially difficult subject to teach remotely, but Crook – a science teacher himself for 15 years – says this need not be the case. His PhD research from Sydney University, on the impact of technology on students in the sciences, has come into its own during COVID. “I work with Year 11 students and we’re

using simulations. I designed a simulation back in 2006, on Thomson’s experiment, because it required expensive equipment most schools didn’t have. Also, it was dangerous so only the teacher could use it. With simulations, students can do the experiment for themselves. That is very empowering.”

As for teaching the teachers during the pandemic, Crook says the blended PD model works well.

“I am now running a theory workshop for physics, and when lockdown finishes, I’ll do hands-on, face-to-face experiment workshops, though you can run these to a degree online with simulations. There are challenges but also lots of opportunities. Fortu-

student privacy protection; and easing the administrative burden on teachers by automating tasks.

The Accelium (Mind Lab) projects, for example, are helping overcome some of the problems associated with on-and-off lockdowns. Accelium’s blended learning solutions combine the use of an online learning portal, where students play and learn simultaneously, with multimedia lessons that switch seamlessly between remote and in-class learning.

“The ‘anytime, anywhere, any device’ game-based solution provides the platform for students to learn at their own pace, observed and adapted by artificial intelligence at home or in school,” says Chris

“Our timetabling software works a little like the navigation system in a phone or car, where the user simply enters their destination and the app works out the best path” Michael Emmanuel, Edval

nately, the tech is a lot more reliable than it was a few years ago.”

All systems go Of course, with remote learning, teachers and students are more reliant on tech than ever before. The winning software providers are addressing all those areas that are front of mind for teachers, schools and parents, including ease of use; cloud-based online learning tools that can be accessed securely from anywhere and on any device; seamless integration with existing systems; ready access to tech support; the ability to easily and regularly track student progress and provide timely feedback; data and

Ramsden of Accelium, who sees himself as a crusader for contemporary capabilities.

“This facilitates the continuation of engaging human-centric thinking skills and wellbeing in a medium which stimulates and inspires the students. Educators, who are the master chefs, can modify the content – our menu – as they see fit and ensure the relevant transferences are made to daily life. And they can easily see progress being made in dedicated data centres.”

The platform and associated pedagogy enable schools to make the most of precious resources – ie time and teachers – by helping teachers engage their learners quickly and efficiently, says Ramsden.

METHODOLOGY Between May and June 2021, The Educator invited education service providers catering to schools across Australia to participate in our inaugural TEW 5-Star Service Providers awards.

Entries were invited across nine categories: learning management systems, recruiters, student and school management systems, school uniforms, interactive learning, performance tracking, suppliers, professional development and security software.

The team received a steady stream of submissions. Of the winners, 14 were based in NSW, four in South Australia, six in Queensland, one in Tasmania, three in Victoria, five in Western Australia, six in the US and one in Colombia.

By the end of the judging process, The Educator team narrowed the entries down to 43 of the sector’s most outstanding service providers, producing the highly anticipated TEW 5-Star Service Providers 2021 list.

“Lessons can be easily modified to suit different learning situations and promote independent learning without the need for constant supervision.”

As well as facilitating learning, efficient software solutions are also essential for managing, securing and storing schools’ vast volumes of data.

“Schools should look for platforms that are open and standard to ensure they have complete flexibility over how and where they run their system and keep their data,” says Sander Bangma, head of LMS at open-source learning platform Moodle, a winner in the learning management systems category.

“In the case of software like Moodle www.theeducatoronline.com

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5-STAR AWARDS 2021: SERVICE PROVIDERS COVID CLOSURES: HOW PREPARED WERE AUSTRALIA’S SCHOOLS? Teachers who let students use ICT for projects or classwork pre-COVID OECD average

53% Australia

78%

Teachers who felt they could support learning through digital tech OECD average

67% Australia

78%

Source: OECD 2018 Teaching and Learning International Survey (TALIS)

LMS, the source code is licensed in a way that allows anyone to download the entire software for free, to change how it works by writing new code, or to add features to it. This means Moodle is accessible to all schools, irrespective of the demographic or socioeconomic profile.

“Plus, schools have the ability to customise Moodle for their specific requirements, whether for a purely online delivery model or blended learning environment. This kind of freedom in education technology is fundamental to allowing education to flourish and grow in a more equitable and accessible way.”

Open-source learning provides additional benefits, says Bangma, not least access to a large community of users who are busy fixing bugs, writing new features, updating documentation, sharing tips and resources, helping new users, and delivering a secure management system. Furthermore, schools can have complete control over their data, including how and where they store it.

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Top marks for simplicity One common hallmark of all the software solutions provided by the winners is simplicity and ease of use. Edval Timetables is one such solution that makes the complex task of scheduling lessons seamless and user-friendly.

“Schools now need to incorporate the expectations of the school community and educational authorities to be delivering learning in dynamic and creative ways, all the while catering for individual needs of students both academically and from a welfare perspective.

The timetable is now a ‘moveable feast’,” says Michael Emmanuel, Edval’s managing director.

Add to that school closures, remote learning and staggered returns to school from lockdowns – including internal contact tracing – and educators increasingly need intelligent software to sort out the timetable tangle for them.

“Our Edval timetabling software works a little like, and I’m oversimplifying here, the navigation system in a phone or car, where the traveller simply enters their destination and the app works out the best path. Schools define numerous destinations, where teachers can be allocated which class, what rooms they can use and how they need to be spread over a week, fortnight or more. Our software takes this information and searches for the best path.”

Ease of integration with existing systems is also key, says Emmanuel. “Driven purely by customer demand, we integrate with over 60 other software vendors around the world.”

Another platform that is simplifying a crucial and complex task is Cisco Meraki.

Safety – both physical and, increasingly, cyber-related – is among schools’ top concerns, and security is embedded in every part of the Meraki platform, from on-device encryption to daily dashboard penetration testing.

“Our platform simplifies the technology to ensure valuable IT resources are able to focus on critical issues,” says Paul Suhr, sales manager at Meraki.

“Meraki is designed to protect people, devices and assets, both physical and digital, with products ranging from next-generation firewalls to the latest technology to safely bring students back into the classroom.

“Our smart cameras and Wi-Fi access points allow IT teams to monitor safe physical distancing and face mask usage by providing access to video from any device.

Simple device location techniques show where students are congregating and where pinch points may be.”

This feature highlights only a small sample of the outstanding businesses that made it into the list of 5-Star Service Providers. Whether they supply textbooks or tech, desks or data management, all of them deliver exceptional service and support, innovative and user-friendly products, sustainable solutions and value for money.

2021

SERVICE PROVIDERS

INTERACTIVE LEARNING

RECRUITERS

Educator Impact

ClassCover

Hutton Consultancy

Phone: 1800 864 896 Website: educatorimpact.com

Edutemps

Randstad Education

rontline Recruitment Group F & Express Employment Professionals ANZ

Accelium Australia Mathspace Microsoft

T es Australia and Smart Education Australia Vivid Teachers

SCHOOL UNIFORM

STEM Punks

LEARNING MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS Open LMS

A Plus Schoolwear

Noone Wearhouse

Gosford Tailoring

P&C Uniforms

Mr Charles

T udor Uniforms

SECURITY SOFTWARE

Phone: +61 1300 913 112 Website: openlms.net

Cisco Meraki

Schoolbox

Phone: +61 2 8397 9000 Website: meraki.cisco.com/en-au

Phone: 1300 932 338 Website: schoolbox.com.au

EndPoint Anti Virus

Canvas eSkilled

STUDENT AND SCHOOL MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS

Google Classroom

Educator Impact

Moodle SEQTA

Phone: 1800 864 896 Website: educatorimpact.com

STEM Punks

Edval Education

PERFORMANCE TRACKING

Phone: +61 4 1056 1054 Website: edval.education

Tableau

Track One Studio

PeopleBench SENTRAL

PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT CrookED Science Website: crookedscience.com ACEL Coursera Educator Impact STEM Punks

Synergetic TASS Xuno

SUPPLIERS Engadine Music UJIFILM Business F Innovation

P ortable Partitions Australia Resource Furniture Teacher Superstore

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SPECIAL REPORT SPECIAL REPORT BUSINESS STRATEGY

5-STAR AWARDS 2021: SERVICE PROVIDERS

CISCO MERAKI Phone: +61 2 8397 9000 Website: meraki.cisco.com/en-au

W

hen pushing boundaries is part and parcel of an organisation’s mission, the new frontier of remote and hybrid learning is relatively simple to traverse. This is the case for Californiabased IT company Cisco Meraki, whose cloud-based platform is helping Australian schools to maintain learning in an everchanging environment.

According to a recent study by the Center for Digital Education, access to the technology and connectivity required for remote learning is a paramount concern for many schools – and it’s one of pain points that Meraki is addressing.

“Our solution can help with dependable outdoor Wi-Fi and a cellular gateway that can be deployed in a matter of minutes, then managed from anywhere,” says Meraki product specialist Paul Suhr.

“And the platform helps IT teams push the boundaries of what’s possible with open APIs, allowing easy integrations with third-party technologies or creating a custom solution to achieve a more connected and secure school with less effort.

“The broad ecosystem of partners enables our customers to quickly meet the need for

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new services, such as applications that allow students to securely and rapidly enrol and manage their devices on your network even before they step on campus.”

When it comes to remote learning, screenbased distractions can be a problem for students – which is where Meraki Systems Manager comes in. This software enables teachers to lock managed iOS and Android devices to specific applications during lesson time, encouraging students to stay focused on learning. Apps can also be easily added or removed as required.

Security is another crucial consideration for schools worried about data protection and student wellbeing, especially in light of a recent report by the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner naming the education sector as the third most likely source of privacy breaches. In this area, Meraki helps schools’ IT teams to safely run the network from anywhere.

“Security is embedded in every part of the Meraki platform, from next-generation firewalls and on-device encryption through to daily dashboard penetration testing,” says Suhr. The platform enables IT teams to

bock harmful content online, stop malicious files and viruses, ensure student privacy and protect student data, secure end-user devices, find lost or stolen devices, and protect against cyberattacks.

When students are back in the classroom, physical health and safety are also safeguarded using Meraki’s smart cameras and Wi-Fi access points, which allow IT teams to monitor physical distancing and face mask usage by providing access to video from any device.

Of course, it’s one thing to offer all the bells and whistles; it’s quite another to deliver them in a user-friendly manner that saves time and lightens the load of schools. Meraki prides itself on doing exactly that. Its goal is to “engage customers in conversational, understanding dialogue that reveals both the quality of our technology and our willingness to help humans and organisations thrive with it”.

By deploying a full-stack Meraki solution, schools have been able to simplify and streamline their network infrastructure, with robust wireless connectivity to all sites, even with limited IT support. This allows the IT team to focus on adding value to the school’s brand instead of fighting fires.

DR SIMON CROOK

Founder, CrookED Science

Website: crookedscience.com

D

r Simon Crook knows all about the challenges of teaching K-12 science.

Teacher shortages, the cost of equipment, the rigours of the syllabus… Throw in repeat lockdowns, and it’s a highly stress-causing formula. However, this teacher-turned-education consultant is passionate about fostering a love of science in children from an early age.

“Even with the struggles teachers face, you feel it’s all worthwhile when you see former students go on to work in groundbreaking research that is going to benefit society. The youth of today are a lot more attuned to social justice and environmental challenges, human rights and equity. And with STEM skills, they can do something about it.”

Through his award-winning STEM education consultancy CrookED Science, Crook works with primary and secondary schools providing, among other offerings, student mentoring, revision workshops and accredited professional development to help teachers deliver hands-on science and technology.

After 15 years teaching science in the UK and Australia, Crook moved into a role helping high schools implement tech in the classroom.

He then did a PhD at Sydney University, researching the impact of technology on students in the sciences. When a new science

syllabus was announced for primary schools, he identified a need – and set up CrookED Science to help teachers navigate the new course material. Initially branching out into professional development in physics, in response to demand from high schools, he recruited an expert team of five to begin offering PD in all the sciences, all over NSW. It was going great guns – then COVID happened.

Despite losing some of his face-to-face business due to lockdown, Crook made the most of his time writing articles published in national journals about HSC Band 6s and the progression of K-12 science pedagogy.

He also found that having already worked in the online space made it easier to adapt his services to the remote environment.

“Yesterday I ran a home learning, hands-on experiment Zoom session for pre-school: twoto five-year-olds. It was quite exciting! I engaged my youngest son as my assistant”.

Even in lockdown, Crook says so much is possible. “For primary schoolers, the equipment they need is at home: plastic cups, milk, food colouring, bicarb soda, vinegar, paddle pop sticks, playdough, rulers…”

Crook believes there is a big misunderstanding around STEM, particularly at the primary level. “It’s not as important that

students pick up the knowledge – they get that later in high schools. To me, the holy grail is for students to design their own experiments, pursue their own line of enquiry. I tell teachers that if kids ask wacky questions about black holes, you don’t need to know the answer; get them to research it. What they need are the skills to run fair tests. When I give teachers permission to prioritise the skills and show them it’s straightforward, they breathe a huge sigh of relief.”

With multiple gongs and accolades to his name, what’s most gratifying is the feedback from schools, especially when it’s unsolicited, like a principal or a parent thanking him for the opportunity he’s created.

And then sometimes Crook strikes professional gold.

He mentors gifted STEM students, one of whom is a computer whiz. “When he was in Year 4 (chronologically Year 3), I put him in touch with some astrophysicists because we really needed to channel his skills. They threw a whole lot of data our way, and we had this kid calculate the percentage of dark matter in the galaxy. He’s doing postgrad stuff, aged 10.

Together with the school, who have been amazing, we are giving him incredible opportunities he wouldn’t otherwise get.”

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5-STAR AWARDS 2021: SERVICE PROVIDERS

EDVAL EDUCATION Phone: +61 2 8203 5455 Website: edval.education

E

dval Education empowers schools and enables great teaching worldwide by creating intelligent online products and services. It has been providing high-quality timetables for Australian schools since 1998.

After Edval’s acquisition by Tes Global in December 2019, it has accelerated its global expansion and now operates in 16 countries, including the US, Singapore, Italy and the UAE. Over 800,000 students worldwide rely on an Edval timetable every day. By 2020, Edval had successfully held its two inaugural customer appreciation events in Sydney and Melbourne, launched four new product features that specifically address the needs of schools relating to COVID-19, and migrated its cloudbased modules to AWS to enhance security, scalability, and availability to consumers.

Early this year, Edval delivered a new learning online environment, which has transitioned its core training modules to a hybrid format. In addition to COVID-19-specific features, Edval has also released over 20 significant features across its product stack, plus an extended version of its two products. It also added and/or improved integrations with many education software vendors.

Edval continues its journey towards offering fully cloudbased solutions and refining its roadmap. This huge undertaking aims to deliver a consistent user experience across its products, support changing work environments and flexible working practices, enable development of requested features, and create a platform that aims to meet emerging school requirements.

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EDUCATOR IMPACT Phone: 1800 864 896 Website: educatorimpact.com

E

ducator Impact (EI) has been helping schools become a better place to teach and learn since 2012. EI supports school leaders, teachers and staff by delivering actionable insights on wellbeing, culture, engagement and vocation to help them improve student outcomes.

EI has always focused on building long-term partnerships with schools. In fact, EI continues to partner with the schools it has been working with since its inception. EI has a passionate team of customer success specialists, with a dedicated member of that team assigned to each school.

“This helps us understand each school individually,” says Joe Thurbon, co-founder and chief technology officer of EI. “Our pursuit of transformational technology never hides the fact that it’s people who make a difference – we build the platforms that amplify their impact.”

EI has continued to help schools stay connected with their students through a tumultuous period. Its platform has helped identify the young people who are flying under the wellbeing radar. Perhaps the most satisfying impact EI has had was seeing students say “thank you” to one another using the platform almost half a million times.

EI is now working to launch a primary school-specific version of Pulse in Term 4 this year.

SCHOOLBOX Phone: 1300 932 338 Website: schoolbox.com.au

S

choolbox has been transforming K-12 schools through technology since 2012. The company provides a virtual learning environment that can be customised to each school’s needs and takes a holistic approach to student learning. Joining the Schoolbox community means getting access to qualified educators who provide professional development and consulting support on an ongoing basis.

In these challenging times, Schoolbox has integrated with synchronous learning platforms such as Microsoft Teams and Zoom to support its clients’ remote learning experience. The organisation also extended further support to school communities by adapting its software and adding more customer support staff. A recent initiative by Schoolbox was the introduction of learning moments and badges (micro-credentialling) to primary and secondary schools.

A locked browser feature will be launched soon to assist schools in conducting examinations remotely.

To help school communities seamlessly bring together the best-of-breed software to support parents, teachers, and students, Schoolbox has started a new program called Premier Partners.

Under this partnership program, Schoolbox has teamed up with Intellischool to integrate its Albitros analytics software and insight tools within the Schoolbox platform. The powerful K-12 cloud-based analytics tool provides actionable insights to improve student learning.

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