We are progressing well with our target to achieve self-funding status and are receiving testimonials from schools throughout the country describing the cost savings and benefits they are experiencing from getting their technicians trained and implementing FITS.

We in The FITS Foundation are more convinced than ever of the tremendous benefits that FITS provides in terms of cost savings, improved service delivery in schools and positive outcomes on teaching and learning.

In light of the very difficult times that schools are experiencing currently we are putting together a comprehensive consultancy package to include assessment of where they are currently, training and accreditation for their technicians and hands-on assistance with implementation of FITS to help them realise savings and benefits in the shortest time possible.

Contact FITS on telephone number 0 1 9 2 6 8 0 0 1 2 1 for more details.

Regional Training Courses

The following training courses are now scheduled for 2010.

Midlands

• 22nd of March – FITS Practitioner.
• 29th of April – FITS Practitioner
• 12th of May – FITS Manager
• 24th of May – FITS Practitioner
• 23rd of June – FITS Manager
• 28th of June – FITS Practitioner
• 29th of  July – FITS Practitioner
• 9th of August – FITS Manager
• 23rd of August – FITS Practitioner
• 27th of September – FITS Practitioner

These courses are held at Neos IT Training in Worcester.

For more details or to book, please contact Neos on 01905-726222

London

• TBC April – FITS Practitioner

For more details or to book, please contact Neos on 01905-726222

Exeter

• 12th of April – FITS Practitioner @ Exeter – FULL
• 1st of June – FITS Practitioner @ Exeter
• 1st of September – FITS Practitioner @ Exeter
• 26th of July – FITS Practitioner @ Exeter

For more details and to book, please contact South West Grid for Learning on 01392 381371 or visit http://www.swgfl.org.uk/News/SWGfL-FITS-Training/Overview

Dorset

• 19th of April – FITS Practitioner @ Dorset – FULL
• 26th of April – FITS Practitioner @ Dorset

• 5th of July – FITS Practitioner @ Dorset

• 26th of April – FITS Practitioner @ Dorset
• 10th of May – FITS Practitioner @ Dorset
• 25th of May – FITS Practitioner @ Dorset
• 12th of July – FITS Practitioner @ Dorest

For more details and to book, please contact South West Grid for Learning on 01392 381371 or visit http://www.swgfl.org.uk/News/SWGfL-FITS-Training/Overview

North Somerset

• 6th of May – FITS Practitioner @ North Somerset
• 18th of May – FITS Practitioner @ North Somerset
• 25th of May – FITS Practitioner @ North Somerset
• 6th of July – FITS Practitioner @ North Somerset
• 13th of July – FITS Practitioner @ North Somerset

• 6th of September – FITS Practitioner @ North Somerset
• 13th of September – FITS Practitioner @ North Somerset
• 20th of September – FITS Practitioner @ North Somerset

For more details and to book, please contact South West Grid for Learning on 01392 381371 or visit http://www.swgfl.org.uk/News/SWGfL-FITS-Training/Overview

The FITS Practitioner course is a 2 day course.

The FITS Manager course is 3 days.

We are working on training course and exams being available throughout the UK over the next few months.  Please check this page periodically for more details.

We now have a schedule of training course available for the Midlands and the South West of England. These are offered via are partners who have been helping pilot the new verison of FITS.

For the full breakdown of scheduled courses please see FITS Training Course Schedule.

We are working with additional training partners to help get UK wide coverage over the next few months. As new venues are added, these will be updated in the schedule.

We have just finished updating some of the original FITS case studies. These have been updated to reflect the benefits delivered by FITS version 2. These are also in our new colourful FITS brand which will will use for many of our publications.

There is also a new case study for Wickersley school which has achieved exceptional results in supporting their staff and learners.They are very much at the leading edge and really show what can be achieved.

The case studies can be found at http://www.thefitsfoundation.org/testimonials/case-studies/

A group of ICT Technicians and managers from the Torbay area took the first FITS professional examination on the 14th of December, 2009.

9 people successfully passed the support practitioner examination at the Torquay Civic Centre and were presented their certificates by Torbay Mayor Nick Bye and Steve Lucey, Director from Becta, which is the national Government Agency responsibile for driving innovation in Eductation through technology.

John Pering, ICT adviser at Torbay Council, said: “We are committed to improving technology in learning and are pleased to be supporting the FITS qualifications.

The course now runs two days and attendees found this much more beneficial. The first day covers all of the processes of the practitioner accreditation and includes advice on the points that our trainers need to cover.
On the second day the delegates work through a case study of a typical school going through a FITS implementation.

This will now be the format that we will use for all future courses.

The process for gaining this approval is:

• Familiarisation with the FITS reference and quick start guides.This will be sent to you when you book on a FITS “Train the trainer”
• You will then need to attend the training Course
• The reference materials then need to be read in depth.
• We would suggest that you have a practice course run through prior to first presenting the course and in particular become very familiar with the exercises and the messages behind each.
• Then deliver the initial course and use the delegate feedback forms to gauge the success of this and where improvements need to be made.
• The Foundation may attend the initial course to help provide support and feedback.
• Following this, the FITS certified Trainer accreditation can be made.

These are:

• ICT Support in Education (Practitioner)
• ICT Support in Education (Manager)

The first “Train the trainer” courses for the support qualifications have now been successfully delivered for 23 trainers.

The basic process to become an approved FITS training provider is:

1. Send an email to the FITS Foundation requesting more details via http://www.thefitsfoundation.org/contact-us/

2. Arrange a meeting to discuss and agree this with the Foundation.

3. Complete the Traininng partner agreement.

4. The Foundation will then review your application and if successful, you will then be approved as a training partner.

The techniques that comprise FITS are tried and tested and presented in a simplified form so that they can be implemented and used immediately.

In FITS, administrative and technical functions have been kept separate to enable school Heads and Leaders to allocate the most appropriate resources to the tasks.

FITS processes enable school leaders to analyse their ICT support costs and in doing so help keep costs to a minimum.

FITS is designed to enable schools to implement the processes successfully and avoid all of the commonly made mistakes. Equal emphasis is placed on proactive tasks and reactive ones. This is in contrast to the all too common way of working based on reactive only.

Developing your ICT strategy starts with what you want to achieve within your school, your aspirations for teaching and learning. There are a number of elements that influence what you want to achieve and Fits provides useful guidance to help with this.

When you have a clear picture of what you want to achieve in your school, it will be time to develop an ICT strategy to support that vision. Essentially this is identifying how your ICT will be used.

The Fits Management Practitioner accreditation prepares Heads and Senior Leaders for the task of creating and managing an ICT strategy in their school.

This is a major benefit to Service Providers. They can be confident that all of their technicians operate in the same way.

Many Service Providers have expressed a desire to put all of their existing technicians through the Fits accreditation and in some instances will also become accredited Fits trainers.

We welcome this support from the service provider community and look forward to working with them.