Project summary
We all want to give our children the best possible start in life, and their early experiences at school are a critical component of this. As part of the wider Greater Manchester Strategy, Greater Manchester Combined Authority (GMCA) wanted to better the national average for the proportion of children reaching a good level of development at the end of reception.
To do this, GMCA developed the Early Years App, with the goal of digitising the paper-based assessments that were being used to review a child’s development up to the age of 2.5 years. GMCA wanted to establish a central resource to collect and present data from services (including midwifery, health visitors, speech and language specialists), parents, and guardians in one place.
As their expert integration partner, 6B were briefed to integrate the app with electronic health record (EHR) systems, EMIS and SystmOne, giving users access to relevant information that may affect a child’s education, for example, if they attended speech and language therapy sessions before starting school.
Testimonials
“The Early Years app is a huge step forward for our city region and will hugely boost our aim of giving children in Greater Manchester the best possible start in life. In order to execute our vision, we needed the help of a technical partner with a proven track record – and this is where 6B came in. 6B’s technical knowledge and practical integration experience has been vital in making this app function how we envisaged it would, they were also aware of the ethical and privacy considerations that any app involving children would need to meet. We expect the integrations 6B has been supporting us with will further enhance the app and help us deliver further benefits to the parents, guardians and relevant professionals across Greater Manchester using the app”
Phil Swan, Director for Digital, Greater Manchester Combined Authority
