Lyons Township High School District 204 is replacing the software it uses to schedule use of its facilities and to manage work orders and the tasks of its buildings and grounds staff.
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The board unanimously approved a recommendation to use a new web-based software, School Dude, at its Jan. 19 board meeting. The cost for the software will be $6,851 for the remainder of the 2015-2015 fiscal year and about $9,500 a year in future years for the subscription-based service, according to a memo prepared for the board.
School Dude will replace Archibus, which officials said is no longer sufficient to meet the needs of the managing facilities and organizing buildings and grounds tasks.
“School Dude comes highly recommended for what we plan on using it for,” said Ed Tennant, director of technology.
A committee of district administrators and other staff identified School Dude as the best choice. The district also looked at four other software programs and surveyed other similar school districts to learn what software they use.
Some of the assets of the software include that it allows use by multiple facilities managers, and that when reservations for uses of specific facilities are made it triggers work orders for maintenance and custodial support. It also manages rentals of facilities by community groups and can generate on demand work orders for everyday breaks and fixes.
Superintendent Timothy B. Kilrea said it’s important for the district to operate its facilities efficiently and it seeks to have facilities available to users from the community.
“Everyone thinks [the software] is important for tracking facilities and having them available for use by the community and taxpayers,” he said.
The district has two campuses. The north campus is at 100 S. Brainard Ave. in La Grange. The south campus is at 4900 S. Willow Springs Road in Western Springs. It also operates The Corral at 4940 S. Willow Springs Road, which previously was a student union and now is used for community and school events.
“Community members utilize district facilities on a regular basis, whether it is for weekend birthday parties at The Corral or scheduling the community room for meetings,” said Jennifer Bialobok, a district spokesperson. “The Corral is used several times a week on a consistent basis. Use of other facilities is more cyclical in nature.”.
Bialobok said she expects the new software to be useful for planning.
“The facilities management software will enable us to know at a glance who, what, when, where and why facilities are being used,” she said.
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