Our Work

percipio.london: Research Schools Network

A single web application running 30 individual sites, maintained by 130 content authors, hosting hundreds of events for thousands of teachers across the country.

What is the RSN?

The Research Schools Network is a collection of 29 appointed schools throughout England who are tasked with leading the way in the use of evidence-based practice and sharing their expertise.

Through events and online resources they share what they know about putting research into practice to make better use of evidence to inform their teaching and learning – really making a difference in the classroom.

Project overview

On the face of it, the Research Schools Network is a simple web build – a fully content managed site, with training events and a blog. As seasoned web developers, we’ve put countless similar sites of this nature together – however RSN is a different beast entirely.

The RSN is a single web application running 30 individual sites hosting hundreds of events for thousands of teachers across the country for #ResearchSchoolsNetwork

The network of 29 appointed schools is maintained by 130 content authors – with different technical environments and varying capabilities – each having their own set of access permissions. Subsequently this single application (at time of writing) manages a total of 0.25 million data entries that include page structures, events, blog posts and files.

Custom data tooling

Part of the the latest iteration of the project was to facilitate a way of capturing where and how evidence has been shared. This means knowing exactly which schools have attended training events, the local authority they belong to and what sessions they attended.

Through the Metaseed API we are able give direct access to the national schools database and simultaneously combine that with the national postcode database – this allows schools to use an autocomplete function to quickly add data to their training events which, in turn, generates huge insight into the reach of the network.

Not only do we know which schools attended which events, but hot / cold spots can be visually identified for evidence uptake on a geographical representation in addition to leveraging pupil premium percentages and if the events are not reaching designated priority schools.

Instantly the impact of the RSN can be visualised, exported and the data insight can dictate when and where to host and promote new evidential based training.