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Ware County Schools
Sam Ganas
Technology Specialist
Waycross, Georgia
6,100 students

Ware County Collects Important Feedback with Campus Survey
Ware County, in Waycross, GA, has been on Campus since July 2007. Communication and decision making using data was a high priority for Ware leadership. When Superintendent, Dr. Joseph Barrow, Jr., learned about Campus Survey, he seized the opportunity to gather important information about a new extended planning day for teachers. The response rate was more than 90 percent and the information collected was used to improve and direct the next session.

Updating the Home Grown System
For 23 years Ware County Schools had used an AS400 home-grown system that worked well for its time, but faced more and more limitations as technology advanced. As a DOS-like system, it was limited; if a person knew the menu commands, it was easy. If they didn’t know the system, it was a challenge. Therefore, only a few people in the district could operate the program successfully.

"It was time to think about a change," said Tracey (Sam) Ganas, Ware County Technology Specialist. "One choice was to add additional training sessions on the AS400 system. But it didn’t have a parent portal or an integrated grade book. We got every dollar out of that system. However, times have changed and we needed more from a student data management system."

The Campus Advantage
Ware County compared several vendors before selecting Infinite Campus.

"Infinite Campus gave us one-stop shopping. I loved that," said Sam. "It was a true, fully integrated system, including the grade book and report cards. The student information required for state reporting was just there; we didn’t have to try to import it from another program to get it to work. It’s wonderful."

Sam also appreciated the ease of importing external data, like assessments. She recently finished importing the Georgia High School Writing Test. "It was very intuitive," she said. "You click, point, and it’s self evident. I didn’t have to sit and wait for someone to call and walk me through it. If you just look at it and think about it, it makes sense."

As principals become more familiar with Campus, they realize the benefits of the system. Real-time information, about any student, at any time, provides opportunities to respond quickly, to manage operations more effectively, and to be better informed.

As teachers become more familiar with Campus, they like what they see. They’re pleased to have information about the student readily available without calling the office. Although posting grades is still a new process for teachers (in the past it was handled by the data clerk in the central office), the big advantage for teachers is they can report grades from home.

"A lot of the teachers said they do grading at night and now they don’t have to stay at school until 7:00 at night," said Sam. "The ease of the grade book process really means a lot to the teachers."

And finally, the community outreach workers use Campus to track attendance. If a student is absent without an excuse, the community outreach worker can immediately contact parents and find out why the student is not in school. The ability to track this information in real time and follow-up immediately has had a positive impact on communicating with parents and guardians, and ultimately improving AYP.

Campus Survey Success
A few weeks ago, K-12 Solutions, the Infinite Campus Channel Partner in Georgia, was meeting with the information technology (IT) staff for some general training and Jeannie casually mentioned Campus Survey to Sam. Jeannie went through it very quickly to show the overall benefits of this function. Sam went to lunch and when she returned, Jeannie was telling Dr. Barrow about Campus Survey. As soon as Jeannie left, Dr. Barrow said he wanted to do a survey.

Recently the district offered an extended day planning session and Dr. Barrow wanted feedback from the teachers to gauge the success of the activity.

"It was really easy to set it up. I had a choice to create a one or multiple page survey; divide it into sections and have an introduction and conclusion" said Sam. "It was just click, click, click. I love this survey tool."

Sam found the options to personalize output perfect for creating future surveys. It lets her choose from a variety of design types, define respondents, and create templates to reuse, copy, or share. Access to the survey can be controlled by requiring authentication to Campus. And, she can use the data managed within Campus Census, ad hoc filters or a teacher’s roster to build distribution lists.

Dr. Barrow crafted the questions to ensure relevant information would be captured. The survey was then sent to all the teachers via their Campus process inbox. Within a very short period of time, everyone but a handful of people responded, and that was because they were either out or not near a computer.

The survey was posted for only a few days, and it provided feedback that could be used for making future decisions.

"We will definitely use Campus Survey again," said Sam. "When we open the Campus Portal, it will be a great tool to gather feedback from parents and students. We want to know what they are thinking and what they feel they need from us."

Realizing Immediate ROI with Campus
Beyond the survey, Campus has helped Ware County save time and money. Giving more people access to information streamlines administrative processes, allowing staff more efficient use of their time. Day-to-day operations are easier with an integrated system, since staff no longer needs to call the front office to find out where someone is or to get a telephone number.

"We’ve saved time and money with training, too," said Sam. "The Campus workflow and GUI are intuitive. Administrators, staff and teachers pick it up and run with it easily."

Service and Support: Close to Home
Ware County works closely with K-12 Solutions Group giving local support and services that personalized the vendor process. "Jeannie, from K-12 Solutions in Commerce, Georgia, did an excellent job of training and presenting the product to us. And Brock Wilson, Managing Partner of K-12 Solutions, had specific experience with our programs. We were confident in their ability and it was great to work with someone nearby."

Share What You Know
Recently, Sam had an opportunity to present Campus Survey at the Georgia Users Group Conference in Savannah, Georgia. She showed them how easy it was to build, step by step, and the benefits of getting feedback from stakeholders.

Sam summed up the experience in a few short words. "The user group loved Campus Survey. It’s just so easy to use."