Sisra AnalyticsSonar Multi-School
About Sonar Multi-School
Sonar Multi-School gives a multi-academy trust (MAT) one view of the assessment data its schools record in Sonar Tracker. It shows attainment, progress, gaps between groups and statutory results for every school, for the current academic year and the two before it.
What Sonar Multi-School is for
Section titled “What Sonar Multi-School is for”Sonar Multi-School answers trust-level questions from data your schools already hold:
- how attainment in each subject compares across schools, year groups and groups of pupils
- whether pupils who reached a good level of development (GLD) at the end of reception, or the expected standard at KS1, are still on track
- whether gaps between girls and boys, and between disadvantaged pupils and others, are closing
- how statutory results compare across your schools and with national figures
- which schools have entered their judgements for an assessment point
You do not enter anything in Multi-School, and schools have no separate data return to complete.
Who uses it
Section titled “Who uses it”It is for people who work across a trust’s schools, such as the chief executive (CEO), directors of education, school improvement leads and data leads. Headteachers can have trust-level access too. Each person needs a trust-level account.
Teachers and other school staff keep using Sonar Tracker, where each school can see its own Statutory Dashboard and Pupil Overview under Analysis.
Where the figures come from
Section titled “Where the figures come from”Multi-School reads each school’s Sonar Tracker data. Each page shows when its figures were last refreshed, under Last updated.
Who is counted
Section titled “Who is counted”Pages count pupils in different ways, and this changes how you read a percentage.
| Pages | Who is counted |
|---|---|
| Summative Dashboard, subject, progress and attainment pages, Pupil Overview | Pupils with assessment data for the measure at the selected assessment point |
| Statutory Dashboard | Eligible pupils: those in the right year group with the results the measure needs |
| Data completion reports | Every pupil, including those with no judgement |
On the summative pages, a pupil with no judgement does not count as below age-related expectations (ARE). They do not count at all. If a trust has 1,200 pupils and 50 have no judgement yet, every percentage is worked out from the other 1,150.
This stops missing judgements from dragging figures down, but it can hide gaps. A school that has assessed only some classes shows figures for those classes alone. Check the data completion reports before you compare results.
Correct a figure
Section titled “Correct a figure”A missing or unexpected figure usually means a judgement has not been entered, or was entered against a different pupil record. Correct it in the school’s Sonar Tracker. The school’s Account Owner or Account Admin can check.
What your schools need to do
Section titled “What your schools need to do”Figures from different schools can be compared only if the schools assess in the same way.
Use the same summative codes
Section titled “Use the same summative codes”The detailed view on the attainment overview pages needs every school in the trust to use the same summative codes. If one school’s codes differ, only the simple below, at and above view is available. Changing a school’s codes can affect judgements already entered, so talk to your Juniper Education representative first.
Use the same assessment points
Section titled “Use the same assessment points”Most Multi-School pages show one assessment point at a time, such as autumn 2. A school that records nothing at that point drops out of the trust figures for it. Agree which points every school uses and when judgements are due. Two or three a year are enough, and autumn 2, spring 2 and summer 2 match the points where Benchmarking runs. See How many points you need.
Set up the EYFS in the same way
Section titled “Set up the EYFS in the same way”Schools assess the EYFS either by the 17 early learning goals or by the 7 areas of learning. The EYFS combined measures are built from whichever the school uses. A Combined (GLD) figure from one set-up is not directly comparable with one from the other.
Get access
Section titled “Get access”- Sign in to Juniper Portal at
portal.juniper.education, as you would for Sonar Tracker. - If the Select Your Account page appears, choose your trust rather than a school.
- In Portal, select Products in the top bar, then Multi-School.
Multi-School opens in a new window. The first time you sign in through Portal, you set up two-step verification: see Sign in and switch schools.
If Multi-School is not in the Juniper Products list, ask your trust’s Account Owner for access. Trust users are invited from the trust’s own Portal account: see Manage trust users.
To move between your trust and a school, select your initials in the top bar and choose the account under Other accounts. Your trust and school accounts need the same email address.
Data protection
Section titled “Data protection”Multi-School keeps no copy of pupil data of its own. Trust users see figures for every school in the trust, mostly as counts and percentages rather than named pupils. The exception is the Pupil Data Export, which creates a file of pupil-level data.
Juniper publishes a data protection impact assessment (DPIA) for Sonar Multi-School on the Juniper help centre. Search it for DPIA.
What the figures do not tell you
Section titled “What the figures do not tell you”Summative figures are teachers’ judgements, not test results. Unless your schools moderate together, the same judgement can mean different things in different schools. Do not rank schools on unmoderated judgements. To compare schools, use statutory results, or standardised tests or comparative judgement taken in the same window.
Allow for each school’s context: prior attainment, pupil mobility, cohort size and the make-up of the disadvantaged group. Take particular care with junior schools, whose pupils’ KS1 starting points were assessed by another school.
Small groups move a lot. In a one-form-entry primary, a gap between two groups may need to be about 40 percentage points before it is statistically meaningful. That estimate comes from the DfE’s report ‘Making data work’ (GOV.UK).
The progress categories are not the DfE’s progress measures, and the summative pages compare your schools only with each other and the trust average. For national comparisons, use the Statutory Dashboard. Schools with the Benchmarking module can also compare their judgements with other Sonar Tracker schools: see Benchmarking.
Ofsted inspectors do not review internal tracking data, including data a trust produces. Good assessment practice has more on comparing schools fairly.