No homework submitted, breakouts in the hallways, moody pre-teens, and teenagers...the list goes on! Staying in the school administration board, don’t you already have your share of your trouble?

Then why shoulder the redundant volumes of documentation and data? Why not think of implementing an Electronic Document Management System for your school that can also give you a helping hand with the finances?

Hear us out about the why, what, how, and when of the topic, and then decide for yourself!

Electronic Document Management System For Schools In 2020-21

Today’s technological shift demands that schools keep themselves updated in their business administration section too, among other aspects. To digitally transform for 2020 & beyond, any educational institute would need to task their administrators to navigate the new digital landscape.

The primary goal behind using digital document management for any industry is to significantly enhance the functioning of a brand. However, when it comes to specific industry goals and the yielded benefits, the causes can be boiled down to some specific ones. Needless to say, these benefits directly address the industry-specific challenges that create a hurdle in reaching the full potential of the enterprises in question.

In regards to schools, imagine the impact of having better functioning! This impact surely holds the potential to change the educational imbibing at an early stage in the lives of hundreds of students.

The “Why”

For any of the industry genres seeking to deliver quality service even during the pandemic, resorting to tools/systems that are suited to remote working facilities. One of the most preferred systems is the Document Management System. As it works wonder for diverse sectors across the market, its role in the school system can be listed out as below -

Improve access to important documents and data

Let’s say that schools have a lot of paperwork and documents to keep track of. More often than not, and as less likely they are to admit to it, the administrators often lose their trail of paperwork!

With the best possible Document Management System in place, stakeholders can gain easy access to required documents and search the relevant content at the earliest. Feature-rich management systems are also pivotal when it comes to mitigating staff administration time and costs.

Considering the concerned authority stays organized in their approach and adds specific fields like ‘subject access codes’, the access and search functionalities are put to good use. With such DMS in place, the scope for GDPR strategy is also considerably widened.

Simplify compliance

A suitable Data Management Strategy coupled with an equally efficient and tailored document management software solution makes for an enhanced -

• Document retention policies

• Data security

• Record keeping

Considering that the educational administration opts for customized and effective document management for schools, its tailor-made and lenient permission access is effective enough

• To prevent unauthorized access to sensitive information

• To retain only the required information.

Reduce your environmental impact

Wouldn’t you prefer to follow the footsteps of your taught ethics “Go Green”? Well, with the electronic Document Management System at your disposal, you have a shot at playing your part in reducing carbon footprints on behalf of the school (something you can always leverage in front of your stakeholders and competitors!).

Add on to this,

• The reduced clutter in your administrative room,

• Organized distribution of data,

• Store data sans the risks of misplacement, prone to unauthorized access, etc.

Leverage the data in your MIS

As recognized, the role of Management Information System (MIS) In the education sector is crucial. MIS is the core of an educational institute’s data management system and often requires a systemic order to facilitate easy access to the MIS data.

Apart from the convenient access to voluminous data, with a suitable digital Document Management System like the FileHoundEDU, seamless integration into the existing MIS information becomes feasible. This takes out the manual labor involved in the input of data during the classification of documents via its features of auto-filling data fields.

Improve productivity

Scampering for lost documents, running helter-skelter for a piece of crucial documents at the 11th hour, hunting for the signed copies of the previous agreement papers - these are never a pretty sight. Apart from the obvious loss of time involved, it also is a dead giveaway about your mitigated organizational skills. That’s a risk not worth taking!

Under such circumstances, the Document Management System acts as the ultimate Messiah with its streamlined document workflows, boosting productivity over enhanced staff efficiency. This is possible considering the automation and simplification of day-to-day tasks that include -

• Data auditing

• Document approvals

• Data retrieval

When listed, the benefits of the DMS in the educational sector goes far beyond the aforementioned ones. However, considering that these are few of the leverages offered by the system, no institute wants to pass up on an opportunity to refine their educational services.

So, schools and colleges - much like the other industries enjoying sky-high success with Learning Management Systems, are looking forward to an automatized and digitally transformed data/document/record management procedure. However, to reap most of its benefits, organizations need to look into the details of the system & determine the most suitable system.

The “What”

Let’s start by saying that if your institution has been relying on a suitable electronic management document system, then during and despite this pandemic, your organization has had leverage over your competitors. Much can be attributed to efficient operations despite

• Remote workplace and

• An entirely new dependence on virtual platforms for regular classes, tests, and co-curricular activities.

With the recent landscape in consideration, a better understanding of the DMS is essential before the suitable implementation of the same to yield better outcomes.

Defining EDMS for Schools

Thanks to gaining awareness about education, the number of students enrolled is on a rising spree. As much as the globe feels pride in these facts, these give way to an increased set of responsibilities for both the teaching and the non-teaching staff. For the latter, the increased paperwork, data, and documents involved and the management of the same becomes a cumbersome task.

As a solution to this, the Electronic Document Management System was introduced. This is a technology system that enables users to create, edit, distribute, and store all data, documents, and forms.

Based on the level of sophistication, there are a variety of electronic Document Management Systems and are customizable. This empowers organizations with a scope of convenient collaboration and communication between the school administrators and the stakeholders.

Facts and Figures

While the benefits stated above to establish the groundwork for the need to go for a suitable Learning Management System, some facts and figures are essential to throwing some light on its recent popularity.

• The LMS market is predicted to grow from $9.2 billion (2018) to $22.4 billion (2023) at a CAGR of 19.6%.

• By 2020, global investments in education technology are expected to touch $252 billion.

• By 2021, the global LMS and e-learning markets will be boosted to $15.72 billion.

With a developed understanding of the “why” and “what” aspects of DMS in the school/educational landscape, it is time to delve into the details of the “how” section. This will help you resort to the best-possible management systems and implement them accordingly.

The “How”

The initial phase of COVID-19 was a paused-globe. As and how people acknowledged this pandemic and all its shenanigans, the world moved towards a virtual version of their daily schedule. Needless to say, this schedule included the education part as well.

This paved the way for institutions approaching the top web designer and development companies in New York and elsewhere in the globe with the request to create their personalized document management system. The metrics of the system differ as per the industry concerned and developers thus, having a varying approach to creating such DMSs. Among the most preferred ones, here is one -

Step 1: Analyze your requirements

Irrespective of the expertise your chosen web design company holds, as the institute that seeks to gain the most of their tailor-made Electronic Document Management System for schools, you need to lay down your groundwork research before this. This helps you draw out a checklist of what you seek to achieve from your developed management system and ensures that your developers know the prioritized metrics and features for their to-be-developed system.

Step 2: Shortlist companies offering the EDMS solutions

Considering the recent popularity of the management system and the number of companies across the globe offering the electronic Document Management System software, choosing upon a suitable partner, is a challenging task. Settling upon a suitable service provider who will help build an efficient platform requires you to check for the following features in the company of your choice -

• Focused market research

• Location-specific consultation

• Complete team support

• Accepting and flexible enough for new ideas and trends

• Creating electronic document management solutions that cater to the local users

• Making the best tech stack choices.

Step 3: Approach the enterprise

Considering that the aforementioned checklist has helped you out with the choice of your company offering document management solutions, it is time to approach the experts on the team. As clients, you need to be transparent about your current system’s shortcomings and expectations with a detailed list of priorities. With this in place, you are already halfway through with the blueprint of the system.

Step 4: Build the Tailored Solutions

The significant challenge in the creation of the DMS is the blending of the existing and the new management platform. A mixed data environment comprising both paperwork and digital data can pose to be a source of confusion and often hinder any professional efficiency. So, you will need to make sure that the offered tailored electronic document management solutions keep the old and new systems in sync.

Step 5: Collaborate on the strategies

The approached organization will be categorizing the building up of the DMS into 3 sections - creating the document management plan, implementing the plan, and following through. However, for the development stage, you will need to focus on the strategies plotted out that should include -

• Documenting every step

• Analyzing the existing system of filing and retaining documents

• Choosing 1-2 departments as a trial project

• Determining if the complete strategy development and implementation will be carried out internally or externally

• Determining the receiving, processing, reviewing, storage, purgation, or update of documents across your institution.

Step 7: Consider The Web Design Aspect

While the digital transformation of industries and its concerned companies is a commonly accepted phenomenon, enterprises still seek familiarity in the designs that ensure convenience in the navigation aspect.

For the non-teaching staff across educational institutions, the expectation isn’t different. Promoting easy navigation in the chosen education document management requires a thorough follow up with both the development and design teams.

As any reputable brand with years of experience would suggest, the clues lie in -

• Minimalism

• Familiarity-stricken designs

• Content optimized for higher engagement

• Adherence to design psychology

• White space, etc.

Step 8: Build the MVP

As an institute that is running dry on budget owing to the complexities that are a result of the breakout of the pandemic, it is essential to minimize the cost and time involved in the development of document management for education. The best way forward with this would be to opt for an MVP that

• Comprises all the basic functionalities and features of the to-be-developed system

• Is developed faster with fewer resources

• Can be made live to get an idea of the targeted audience’s opinion about the system.

So, with a fully functional MVP in place, you have a shot at identifying the shortcomings of your developed platform sans redundant wastage of money or time.

Step 9: Test and Launch

Testing and launching the developed electronic Document Management System software is the last step in this process and ensures the optimum and accurate functioning of its features. This ensures that the platform stays error-free and holds up to its end of the quality and integrity benchmark. The last thing you would want is your school’s administration section falling down the pitfall of computer algorithm glitches and losing your data and documents in the process.

The “When”

The one-word answer for this is - NOW! Given the

• Storm of digital transformation that is sweeping the industries off of their feet,

• The outbreak of a pandemic pushed everyone closer to embracing the virtual global outlook

• The alarm going off on the economical landslide that has yet to reach its peak

• The chances of an extended quarantine period, thanks to COVID-19, and the uncertainty of the “old normal” coming back anytime soon.

 -the educational sector cannot afford to procrastinate their DMS endeavors any further.

Conclusion

Skimming through the “Why”, “What”, “How” and “When” of the implementation of Document Management System in the educational sector will give you a clearer insight into its undeniable importance given the recent landscape. As the stats laid down, the system is here to stay and grow in the coming 5 years.

Given the digitization that you have and are expected to witness, as education administrators, all that you can do is follow in the footsteps!