Choosing a cloud computing provider

Not all cloud storage services are made equal

‘Always there’ backups, access from anywhere and more gigabytes of storage than you could ever use – the chief benefits of cloud storage are obvious, but those aside, what are the school-friendly features and functions that make some solutions better for your setting than others? Terry Freedman suggests some questions you need to ask.

An essential starting point before looking at potential cloud computing providers is to carry out an audit. This will help you to be more fully informed when comparing different solutions. Here are the things the audit should cover:

●      What data is being held, and where?

●      How much storage space are you using?

●      how much storage capacity do you have?

●      How much is your current setup is costing in terms of IT support and staff time? ( Potentially, you may be incurring significant extra electricity costs in running the server(s), not to mention IT technical support costs.

●      Is your broadband good enough for your needs?

Carried out the audit? Here are the questions to consider.

General considerations

When looking at potential suppliers of a cloud computing solution, there are a few important generic questions to ask. Does the company have a large customer base, and been in the business a long time? Does it have excellent “uptime” -- meaning 100% of the time? (After all, even just 10 minutes of a lesson spent not being able to access or save work is potentially a lesson ruined.)

Cost

The costs may include the need to upgrade your broadband before doing anything else, if your audit has identified the need to do so. For the cloud service itself, the consideration is not so much Total Cost of Ownership but cost per user or cost per service (or an amalgamation of the two). Essentially, cloud services are subscription-based.

Bear in mind that whatever the costs of moving to the cloud, there will be potential cost savings too: in IT maintenance, staff time and up-front purchases of replacement servers.

Capacity

How much storage space is provided compared to how much your school needs? Again, this is where your audit will prove useful. Is it scalable, meaning: can you use more space as you need it? Crucially, can you go over the limit before arranging more space: that is, will there be a sort of overdraft facility? Also, can the resources devoted to different requirements be assigned automatically?

Security and access

What options there are for granting staff access to the storage facility and setting privileges? Ideally, it will be based on policies or “personas” That means, for example, that a member of the SLT who is responsible for pupil data collection may more privileges than colleagues who don’t. In fact, it may be that a member of the admin staff is the only person who needs a high level of access.

Security and data

Backups should take place automatically, and in several places. In effect, you want to be assured that if the cloud company’s main server fails, your data will still exist on another one. There also needs to be robust security arrangements in place, in the light of GDPR requirements. The best starting point here is the DfE checklist for suppliers, to be found at http://bit.ly/PSMdfeGDPR. You can request a blank form to give to your preferred supplier, or you can use the list of suppliers that have already completed the checklist, and which are listed in that document.

Finally, as well as the key considerations listed here, do have a look at a very useful document from the DfE for guidance on moving over to the cloud: http://bit.ly/PSMdfeCloud.

This article was first published in Primary School Management magazine. 

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