News

August 2010
PATAT 8th International Conference

The 8th international PATAT conference was held in Northern Ireland and hosted by Queen’s University in Belfast. 120 delegates from around the globe - including two from CELCAT - gathered for 4 days of presentations, discussions and networking events. All sessions were held in the INTO building at Queen’s.

This year PATAT was divided into two streams; one offering theory based presentations and the other from practitioners. Adrian Gough, CELCAT Account Manager represented CELCAT at the practitioner stream and Adrian Jones, Applications Architect represented CELCAT at the theory stream.

CELCAT has attended the last three conferences and gained valuable knowledge and understanding of automation techniques. No doubt some of this will find its way into the eagerly-awaited CELCAT Timetabler 7 Automation product. It was also thought-provoking to hear from those trying to use automated software within their institutions. The conclusion seemed to be that it takes a lot of time and effort before the institution can press the ‘magic’ button!.

Networking sessions included a Lagan boats Titanic Cruise (but without the ominous ending!), followed by dinner at a traditional Irish pub where plenty of the ‘black stuff’ was consumed alongside Irish music and dancing. The conference dinner was held at Northern Ireland's seat of power, Stormont where delegates enjoyed a fine meal. The conference concluded with a trip to the Giants Causeway and Bushmills distillery.

CELCAT looks forward to seeing the development of the practitioners stream at the PATAT conference with the prospect of presenting next time around. The 9th PATAT conference will be held in Norway.

July 2010
New Middle East Distributor

CELCAT has recently signed a exclusive distributor agreement with Kuwait TechNet Company (KTC) based in Kuwait City. Initially the agreement covers Kuwait and both companies will support the venture by joint marketing exercises while KTC will take the lead in selling the software, providing first level support and training users. We are confident that the clause to expand the agreement and territories covered will be taken up based on new sales of CELCAT software.

KTC was established in 1998 and specialises in the fields of ICT & security with an emphasis on solution design and implementation. KTC has provided services and solutions to major clients within Government, Banking, Telecommunications, Education, Healthcare and Retail sectors. Within the Education sector their services and solutions include Campus Management & Student Information Systems, Scheduling Software, ERP Finance & HR systems, Student Tracking, Identity Management for students, Student Portal, Library Management, eLearning and access control.

We look forward to working with KTC over the next few years to expand the market in Kuwait and the Middle East.

June 2010
AOC Information, Data and Technology

AoC’s Information, Data and Technology conference provides a great forum for MIS professionals to focus on the key issues associated with data collection and management.

CELCAT will be there to discuss our approach to data integration and to give you the opportunity for a first look at our new web client, CELCAT Live. Why not book June 23rd / 24th in your diary and come and see us at the exhibition?

May 2010
South West Region User Group Meeting

CELCAT Timetabler users in the south west region gathered on Wednesday 12 May 2010 for the second meeting of the South West user group. Delegates travelled from as far north as Leicestershire, as far west as Bridgend and as far south as Southampton. 22 delegates from 13 different institutions attended. The group wished to express their thanks to Strode College for hosting the event and to Elaine Garcia of PCA and Sara Hawker from Strode for coordinating the meeting.

A full day was planned with presentations from users and CELCAT staff. The day kicked off with a warm greeting from Sara Hawker the session chair. Delegate introductions followed with a brief resume of how CELCAT software is used in each institution.

Adrian Gough took the floor following the introductions to present an item dealing with Company news & developments. Particular mention was made of CELCAT Timetabler Live and CELCAT CALI both due for release this summer. Andrew Porter of Strode College then handled a presentation showing how registers and reporting is driven from CELCAT Timetabler.

The morning session concluded with a presentation on CELCAT Pay Claim Management (PCM) from Steve Galloway of CELCAT and a case study presentation by Graham Spavins of Leicester College. These presentations invoked much interest from the audience and many questions were raised.

After an enjoyable lunch it was back down to business for the afternoon session. Seddon Kirk of CELCAT got the ball rolling with a discussion based around the new CELCAT Data Warehouse. This was well received and many are looking forward to its full release later this summer. Some excellent suggestions were made that will help us in developing it further. Elaine Garcia then took up the mantle and showed how Plymouth College of Art is linking Timetabler with popular applications like Facebook – an interesting concept!

The final discussion of the day was chaired by Lance Mason of Filton College. Discussions took place around the impact of student enrolment on timetabling & the most effective way to handle modular courses when timetabling.

April 2010
AoC Human Resources Conference and Exhibition

AoC’s Human Resources Conference is the must-attend HR event for Colleges in 2010 bringing together HR professionals working in the further education sector with top level speakers, exhibitors and peers.

CELCAT is exhibiting at this event and anticipates a favourable response to its new and exciting web application, CELCAT Pay Claim Management.

If you plan to attend this event on 4-5 May 2010, we encourage you to visit our stand located in the main exhibition area, ICC Birmingham. And don’t forget to pick up a CELCAT Piggy Bank!

March 2010
Inaugural CELCAT User Group in Scotland

On Friday 12th February CELCAT Timetabler users in Scotland and The Borders enjoyed the first CELCAT Scotland User Group meeting held at Glasgow Caledonian University in the CPD suite. 24 users from 17 different institutions attended from as far north as Elgin in Moray, right down to Carlisle.

Ian Grimes CELCAT Account Manager for Scotland opened the day by welcoming all and thanking them for making the effort to attend. Special thanks were offered to June Barton and Shazia Rafiq from GCU for organising the event.

A delegate from each institution then provided a short resume of how their organisation uses CELCAT Timetabler and which additional modules they use such as CELCAT Attendance, or whether Timetabler is linked to their Student Records System etc.

A member discussion followed allowing users to question and discuss with each other about the different ways that CELCAT Timetabler is used and what methods of timetabling they find works well for them so that good practice can be propagated throughout the various organisations.

There was also considerable discussion with CELCAT Attendance Users from institutions interested in using this module for their attendance recording and reporting in the future.

Tim Dix CELCAT Account Manager for South East England encouraged users to sign up for the CELCAT Portal and outlined some of the benefits that can be gained such as access to documentation and additional bespoke software for the CELCAT user community. He outlined too that users can submit articles of interest to the portal to share with others and that users can follow CELCATNorth on Twitter with occasional tweets about new users, upcoming releases, tips and tricks etc.

After lunch the delegates were given a tour of the striking Saltire Centre the focus of learning and student services at Glasgow Caledonian University.
This was followed by Ian Grimes once more taking the rostrum to outline the new developments CELCAT has in store for 2010, including Timetabler Automation, CELCAT PayClaim, Offline Attendance Recording, Generic Plugin, CELCAT Live, Data Warehouse and Web Diary Service. An exciting year ahead!

The day was rounded off by users expressing that the inaugural Scottish User Group Meeting had been a great success and everyone looked forward to meeting again at Moray College in June.

February 2010
Stevenson College Join CELCAT Community

We are pleased to welcome Stevenson College Edinburgh to the approximately 250 colleges using CELCAT Timetabler in the United Kingdom.

Stevenson College Edinburgh (SCE) was founded in 1970 and is one of the largest colleges in Scotland. SCE enrols around 18,000 students a year, over 3,000 of which are full-time and welcomes in excess of 1,000 overseas students from more than 60 countries including Nigeria, Spain, China, Saudi Arabia and Brazil. Based in the vibrant city of Edinburgh the college offers a wide range of programmes from Introductory courses and NQ’s (National Qualifications), through to HND’s (Higher National Diplomas), BTEC’s and Degree Foundation, via a multitude of study modes such as full-time, part-time, day release, evening, e-learning and open learning courses.

The College felt the need for a greater insight into how its resources were being utilised in order to continue to offer the best service to students. A comprehensive flexible tool was required to help plan the use of those resources more effectively across a number of subject areas all having their own particularity. A number of timetabling systems were investigated with the project team deciding that CELCAT most closely provided:

• the necessary flexibility in timetable management across a number of faculties
• users additional functionality with the potential to configure to individual departmental needs
• an ideal opportunity to manage room utilisation and facilities infrastructure more efficiently
• better utilisation of college personnel
• a systems architecture that allowed many users but with college wide integration
• an ideal opportunity for future development (e.g. future implementation of CELCAT Attendance Management module)
• straightforward interfacing with existing and future systems

Over the next few weeks CELCAT will be training around 59 college staff in using and managing the system. Data will be synchronised with the college’s MIS and timetables will be produced and distributed ready for the start of the 2010/11 academic year.