ANXIOUS Jamaican parents concerned by their children’s academic prospects may soon be able to breathe easier as a revolutionary computer software programme holds the prospect of improving the monitoring of students’ school performance.

The software was developed in the United States to rave reviews by educators and parents alike. A local technology firm, Zed Jamaica, has partnered with a US firm to bring the software known as RenWeb (Renewing School Management – via the Web) here with a mission to transform the relationship between school, students and parents.

RenWeb is an interactive computer software programme that can do multiple applications – all geared at making the educational experience more effective. The software, which is designed to improve and enhance the management of schools, offers the facility of improved record-keeping, the ability to generate timely student reports and can produce detailed analyses as required by the school or the Ministry of Education.

Furthermore, the system is Web-based and therefore facilitates much deeper parent/caregiver interaction with the school. Parents or guardians are able to monitor their child’s academic performance, attendance, homework, and behaviour, without having to visit the school, from the convenient portal of their cellphone and/ or computer.

The state-of-the-art technology vastly simplifies school management and enhances the child’s learning and interpersonal development, as well as offers new platforms for partnerships by corporate interests who also want to invest in the country’s or region’s educational development.

Leading education providers in Jamaica, including Campion College, have already endorsed the software. That process could get added impetus from a visit to Jamaica this week by Mark Wile, vice-president of the firm that developed RenWeb.

Wile and a team from Zed Jamaica led by head, Carlton Grant, will be meeting with education stakeholders such as school principals, education ministry officials, representatives of the Jamaica Teachers’ Association (JTA), student organisations and corporate interests, among others, on June 25 to present the features of the software at the Liguanea Club, New Kingston.

Many experts agree that greater parental supervision and interest in a child’s school work, is an important contributory determinant of academic proficiency. The benefits RenWeb provides are therefore especially suited to Jamaican high and primary/prep schools, including those in rural areas and the inner city, where text messaging is increasingly the preferred mode of communication, enabling a parent to supervise a child’s performance at minimal cost. Such a facility could help address the continuing low performance in core subject areas, namely mathematics and English, in Jamaican high schools.

An analysis of the 2008 Caribbean Secondary Education Certificate exam performance commissioned by a local newspaper, revealed that the overall performance of Jamaican students in both English and math indicated that “slightly more than one-third of those eligible passed the English exam and even fewer, about one in five, passed math”.

Among the features of the system highlighted by administrators, faculty, parents and students, are the ease and speed with which they can access records, schedule classes and keep track of the overall development of students, leaving them with more time to devote to teaching and learning.

As Grant notes, “The system is based upon real-time application, it is about what is happening now with the student and what appropriate interventions are needed.”

Wile is especially proud of the instantaneous aspect of the e-mail and texting features of the software, noting that the system’s security platform is “virtually unbreakable”.

As a teacher in the US testified: “RenWeb has provided me with instant conferencing via its e-mail capabilities. A parent can access their child’s grades while at work and immediately e-mail me from their workplace. RenWeb provides me the ease and convenience of responding immediately to the parents.”