A student or business system implementation is a project that affects the entire school community, from the Superintendent’s office to the school lunchroom, as well as students and their parents. Focus pays special attention to the following major transitional activities:
The key to any good implementation is solid project management. Focus Project Managers have worked in districts so they know the challenges that you face. Your Project Manager will see the process through completion, guiding you every step of the way.
Focus School Software has experience migrating data to Focus using a phased approach. This has proven successful in terms of both managing the data itself and providing a safe environment for end users to learn the processes of Focus. Focus School Software is especially adept at data cleansing, as many records exported from the current system will have errors. There are four critical success factors of our data conversion process:
Focus is a comprehensive, web-based student system but districts continue to integrate with third-party vendors. Working with the district Focus will compile a list of necessary integrations along with the file specifications for the integrations. Focus has a programming team dedicated to integrations.
Integrations can export data from Focus and also import data from the third party application. Food service, special services and transportation departments often take ownership of their data through the third-party application but this information is needed in the student system. Focus provides two-way communication with the vendors and the district.
The foundation of a successful implementation is a comprehensive and timely training program. We work with each district to develop a customized training plan by studying the project plan rollout schedule for each module, the best delivery methods for each target audience, the outcomes of specialty group meetings, and the time constraints to complete the training with participants demonstrating mastery.
Focus trainers have educational backgrounds and trained for school districts before joining the Focus team.
Focus believes different training methods need to be offered to meet the needs of the users. We offer webinar sessions, on-line tutorials, on-line curriculum with end of session evaluations, and site-based hands-on training sessions that provide the needed variety of techniques.
An intensive 4-day Level 1 Certification program designed for IT technical staff is also available and strongly recommended.
Focus offers weekly webinars that provide relevant information, from discussions of new features to how to perform certain processes. These forums are a great way to learn more and ask questions about Focus. Best of all, they are free! See the list below for upcoming topics and click HERE to register.
