School ERP software: what to look for before you buy.
School ERP, school management software and school management system are three names for the same thing: one place to run students, fees, admissions, transport and results. These are the questions that separate a good one from a long module list.
Where does your data live?
Ask who else is in the database. Some vendors keep every school in one shared database; some leave it on one office computer. Aurora gives each school an environment of its own in the cloud.
- Ask who at the vendor can read your records.
- Ask what happens to your school if the vendor has an outage.
Is there one ledger?
If fees are recomputed in each module, reports eventually disagree. Look for one place that owns the money and screens that only display it.
- Can a clerk's receipt and the principal's report ever differ?
- Are discounts recorded openly, as credit notes?
Does it bill the way your school works?
Sibling discounts, month-wise transport, class-wise fee structures and year rollover should be built in, not handled in a spreadsheet next to the software.
- Ask to see a third-child waiver done live.
- Ask to see a child who rides the bus for three months.
How are updates and backups handled?
Updates that reach every school at the same moment are risky. Look for signed, versioned updates installed school by school, and for backups that are checked by restoring them.
- Ask how a backup is proven to work.
- Ask for the name and version of what is running.
What is live, and what is planned?
Many module lists blur the two. Ask for each room to be labelled as in use, rolling out or next. Aurora labels every room on its features page.
- Ask for a written quote that lists the core and each add-on.
Questions.
What is the difference between school ERP and school management software?
In practice nothing: both mean software that runs students, fees, admissions, transport and results together. ERP is the older, enterprise-sounding name.
Should school software be cloud or installed at the school?
Ask where your records physically live and who can read them. Aurora runs a separate environment per school, managed from one care console, so your data is not mixed into a database shared with other schools.
Why do fee numbers sometimes differ between reports?
When several modules recompute balances separately they drift apart. A single ledger that owns the money avoids that.
Does Aurora publish prices?
We quote in writing per school, listing the Console core and each add-on, after a walkthrough.