The current system of student management is fundamentally flawed due to it's lack of portability between institutions, all schools surveyed regarded this as a major failing in addition to the lack of expandability and customization while still allowing easy file transfer.

The ability to cater for education outside the classroom is inherent in the Edu Zone system, varying levels of access set at faculty level allow all students to access resources & information relevant specifically to them from anywhere with an internet connection, given the uptake and embracing of portable devices within schools this is especially timely and being web based it means that there are no issues with cross platform access, (Macintosh and/or PC).

The Edu Zone system is designed to fit into the smallest preschool through to the high school with the largest faculty and student roll. Modules applicable to each school are added as required or developed if a school comes up with something they think they need that is not currently available. As modules are upgraded they are all upgraded across the entire system if requested by individual schools, this means upgrades are not forced on users unless they are critical improvements.

Each system comes complete with full training manuals and each region will have its own Training facilitor as Edu Zone rolls out nationally. Training has commenced with excellent feedback in the Pilot program in Northland and carries a minimal cost to the school.


Educate

The Edu Zone system allows students to access all of their resources from one place, their login gives them access to assignments, research links, image files, pop quizzes, self marking exams, feedback, frequently asked questions relevant to the subjects, frequently replied answers in order to make them think of the right question and much much more. All this is managed from an easy to use faculty/student interface online making it easy for faculty of any level to allocate resources to students relevant to the subjects they are engaged in.

Faculty can access libraries of lesson plans relative to subject, age of student and teaching style, they can download these lesson plans, make amendments and then re-upload them as a new version for others to utilize. The plans can also be rated so as to set a level of feedback within the industry.


Track

The very essence of the Edu Zone system is tracking the students education life, results, feedback, sporting achievements, everything that's recorded during their time in the education sector, from day 1 at the age of 6 months to the time they leave school, all of their history is stored in secure servers which can only be accessed by the assigned staff at any given time. As the student moves from early childhood learning to primary to intermediate and then onto secondary the files access moves with them. The actual files stay in the same place, just the access changes.


Communicate

Given the mandate of the National Standards to provide accurate regular reporting to parents/caregivers relating to the children in their care, the Edu Zone system allows the relevant parties to access their Childs or children's records from any Internet capable computer providing they have the correct access. The records are kept up to date in real time in coordination with the faculties marking and grading and the students self marking online exams with the aim being reduced administration time for the faculty, while giving unprecedented access to parents relating to their childs progress. Access can be limited to set timeframes to allow the child to progress without being judged on a day to day basis if required. The Reports are presented in an easy to read summary format and a comprehensive manner, enabling the parent all the information they desire without overwhelming them.


Timesaving

The Edu Zone system is designed to help the faculty save time, shared lesson plans, reduced administrative time through self marking exams, access outside of the school grounds and many more elements all combine to help the teachers be more productive within the hours allowed instead of spending hours outside of school marking and writing reports as well as setting up new lesson plans

Cost


The Edu Zone system is provided by Iglu – Online Solutions at no cost to the education sector of New Zealand. The Iglu team see it as an investment in the country’s future.

Student File Transfers

Anyone who has moved their child from one education facility to another knows the pain of having to collect the students files, all of them, dental records, sporting achievements, art pieces, reports, completed work that’s been submitted, everything that makes up the students education to date. and that’s just a preschooler, and then handing over all of that material to the new institution and hoping that not only will they enter it all correctly, but that at some stage will return it all..

The Edu Zone system stores all of the students records on Secure Servers based in Albany, Auckland. The files need never move and simply grow as new information is added to them throughout the students education. Upon moving to a new location or simply rising through the years, the information is accessed by each new facility and added to as required. As the student moves location, the enrolling officers in the current location and the intended location swap information and generate new access codes, the old codes become useless which gives security to the student/parents that the information is only accessible by the authorised persons.


Education Outside the Classroom

With communicable diseases such as Swine Flu, Measles, Rubella and the like still being an issue, giving the student body the ability to be educated remotely is problematic with existing systems, either they are too generic or they are unable to be adapted to the various learning/teaching styles that exist.

The Edu Zone system caters for adaptability relevant to each teacher and their particular style while allowing the student to access teaching notes, assignments, exams, resources and help from any internet capable computer. Each student has a login and password issued as part of the Student Management system and corresponding to their Central Student Number as assigned by the Ministry of Education. For assignments that cannot be completed via the internet, students are able to submit their work online through a secure upload facility which alerts their teacher via email.

With the implementation of real time video and real time chat forums the ability to interact with the students is enhanced.


Business Directories

The Edu Zone system gives the ability for students and parents to “network” together through a comprehensive business directory module, this gives those parents who work, a directory on the school site, where they can list their business abilities. This is intended to help generate a sense of community within the schools as well as providing a valuable service to the parents and the school.


Banner Advertising

To offset the immense development costs of the Edu Zone system we place banner advertising on the schools web interface. This advertising is relevant to login, which means students only see content relevant to them. This is the same for faculty & parents. We have five main sectors for which we do NOT place advertisements in the Edu Zone system.

These are listed below:

• Alcohol
• Adult
• Pharmaceutical
• Tobacco
• Gambling

Additionally each school is invited to provide us with a list of other sectors they may wish to exclude from advertising on their sites, similarly they are also invited to supply a list of sectors they would like to have advertise. This advertising is currently used to provide added value to sponsors etc.

Each school receives 15% of the Revenue Producing Banner income back as banner credits which allows them to place their own adverts at little or no cost. These can be for school productions, situations vacant, enrolment drives etc or alternatively they can use them to generate an income by using them for silent auctions etc


ItsOnline.co.nz

The Edu Zone system comes complete with the www.ItsOnline.co.nz module, this allows students, parents & faculty to list items for sale or trade on the schools website. This is designed to facilitate uniforms, books, equipment and other items to be traded within the school and the rest of New Zealand.  This will help generate a sense of community also.

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