Norfolk County Council - Case Study
Norfolk County Council can now spend more time supporting children and young people and their families and less time on IT management. By reducing the administrative burden and removing duplication, Synergy education management system frees local authorities up to focus on improving outcomes.
Synergy guides Norfolk County Council along its 20-year development journey toward achieving positive outcomes for children and young people.
Norfolk County Council is a long-standing customer. Since 1999, the Council has undergone a huge shift from paper-based systems to a fully online and web-enabled solution for 900+ staff and early years providers as well as implementing self-service tools for schools and parents.
With the exception of the Governors and Transport modules, the Council has now implemented Synergy’s full suite – an education management system that makes information sharing simple – across systems, providers, departments and other authorities.
Introduction
Norfolk County Council recently undertook a Synergy health check with us. This extensive review into how the system is being used has helped to ensure it is being deployed effectively and that the Council is on track to achieve future goals.
As Synergy is modular-based, the Council can select the functionality to suit its needs. One of Norfolk County Council’s key objectives was to reduce the number of spreadsheets and individually held and maintained datasets, as these can very quickly become inaccurate, and also don’t provide the overall picture of a young person.
Synergy’s flexibility as a modular education management system means it can help local authorities achieve more powerful outcomes for families by having all the information they need in the right place at the right time.
Synergy integrates seamlessly with other systems, including third party software, to record and manage all aspects of children’s services. Norfolk County Council’s social care system is supplied and hosted by a different provider and has been fully integrated with the Synergy system; creating a two-way flow of data for looked after children and SEN children, so that social care colleagues get a connected view.
When people are recording data separately in spreadsheets, it very quickly becomes out of date. It also doesn’t allow our colleagues access to the full picture. Synergy gives us a standard way to record, to aggregate data and work together as a department.
Our long-standing relationship with them has grown and developed over time. Today, we consider ourselves development partners in the Synergy technology – we’re often trialling new features and providing key feedback.
The result
- The ability to share information and insight safely and easily across the whole children’s services department – creating full visibility of each child
- Creating closer interaction between families, schools and
other providers - Saving time on data entry – while improving data accuracy
- Achieving interoperability – Synergy fully integrates with the Council’s social care system, which is supplied by a different provider; creating a two-way flow of data between systems for looking after children and SEN children
Inspiring others
Since undergoing a Synergy health check, the Council has run a number of workshops to support staff incorrectly recording data. This has further streamlined processes at the Council and given everybody within children’s services access to the range of information they need.
The Council is now undertaking 18 significant change projects, including implementing further parent-facing portal solutions for online applications of early years funding and free school meals and benefits applications. These tools for parents will supplement the online Admissions module, which the Council has been using for over ten years.
