Press Release

Education Ministry to implement new administrative software system in primary schools

USAID/Jamaica's Expanding Educational Horizons project launches JSAS 7.0 in partnership with the Ministry of Education

Kingston, Jamaica | Wednesday, November 26, 2008

The Ministry of Education is to implement a dynamic new web-based administrative software system for use in the nation’s public schools.

Education Minister Andrew Holness says the Jamaica School Administrative System (JSAS 7.0) software, will be a major tool in the Ministry’s quest to reinforce a culture of measurement, accountability, and evidence-based evaluation in schools. He was speaking at the launch of the software at the Drews Avenue Primary School in St. Andrew on Thursday (November 6). JSAS 7.0 was developed under the Expanding Educational Horizons (EEH) project, a joint initiative of the Ministry and the United States Agency for International Development (USAID).

Mr. Holness also used the occasion of the launch to appeal to school leaders and teachers to embrace new technologies as this was an integral component of the transformation in education.  He says as Minister, he would not tolerate those in the system who resisted efforts to use the technology to enhance the learning process and to improve school management.

USAID Mission Director, Dr. Karen Hilliard, noted that JSAS 7.0 would make it easier for school administrators and education officials to track the performances of schools, students and teachers.  Dr. Hilliard said she was pleased that the Ministry had taken the decision to adopt the software for use across the public school system as this would be a catalyst for improvements in the quality and accountability of education in Jamaica.

JSAS is a management information tool specifically created for Jamaican schools to assist principals and other school administrators to efficiently complete required administrative and diagnostic tasks.  The software stores data at the school, class and student levels and provides fast and easy retrieval of student and teacher information as well as generating student reports and transcripts.  By using a modern tool to capture critical data like attendance and test scores, schools can efficiently meet the administrative and instructional obligations as required by the Ministry of Education.  JSAS 7.0 mimics the Census Booklet, Attendance Register and Numbers Book, tracks and accepts teacher and student attendance, test scores (at both school and national levels), and produces school and students reports. 

Additionally, nearly all the required reports for the Ministry of Education are accommodated, enabling schools to produce accurate, reliable reports while benefiting from organized safe electronic storage and record-keeping.  JSAS has proven itself a worthy tool for teachers, school administrators and stakeholders including the Ministry of Education. 

About JSAS 7.0

• Web-enabled.  This places JSAS online and allows users to manipulate data via the Web. This eliminates the need for JSAS to be installed on any equipment at the school making it accessible from any location, home or school, once there is internet access.
• Platform independent. Developed using the same industrial strength architecture and core platform as Linux, Apache and MySQL, JSAS now operates in the same manner as some of the world’s largest sites, namely Google, Yahoo and Amazon where thousands of servers are connected worldwide and are not platform dependent.
• Secure user logon. The same security technology system used in banking sectors, Secure Socket Layer (SSL) technology, is utilized by the software. This ensures that all data are encrypted from the browser to the central server. All passwords are encrypted in the database, and the system administrator will not know any user’s password. The system administrator will however, still be able to reset passwords even without knowing them.
• Multiple school management. System administrator will be able to manage all schools, as all data stored will be on one central server. Each school’s data will be in one location, giving the administrator the ability to analyze across schools.
• Multiple user access. All schools can be logged on at the same time and use the system effectively.
• Multiple user levels. The login system authorizes access to different users who will have different levels of responsibility depending on the role of the user. Accommodates differences between schools in grading criteria used
• Behavioral Tracking with special features for Guidance Counselors. This provides the ability of recording and monitoring student’s behavioral pattern.
• Parent Skills Bank - created for schools to facilitate easy access to information on skills available in the school community.
• Parent and Teacher Meeting Tracking - This will not be limited to Parent Teacher Association (PTA) meeting but can log any meeting that was held with a parent or relative and the reason for the meeting.
• Tracking of students without birth certificates.  Students will be able to register without a birth certificate number but each report generated termly/yearly will advise the school administration and parent that they need to furnish the school with the outstanding birth certificate.