During my National Diploma days at Osun State Polytechnic in 2017, I once took up a part-time job as a computer assistant in a small school owned by a man called Mr. Akpan.

My job is to keep records of expenses, students who are owing, attendance, etc., inside Microsoft Excel.

Mr. Akpan's school was running smoothly, and a lot of money was coming in.

Two years later, I finished my National Diploma and resigned from the job.

I was in my room sleeping one fateful day when I was called from Osun State by one of Mr. Akpan's staff that their school caught fire in the middle of the night and everything inside had burnt down.

Oh my God.

I was sad, heartbroken, and depressed.

In my mind, I kept asking myself, 'Where will Mr. Akpan start from?'

The following day, I called Mr. Akpan, and he told me he had moved on. He said he had just come back from an organization that wanted to give him a huge sum of money to start afresh, but they didn't give it to him because he was unable to provide the past records of his school.

The organization wanted to be sure he could meet up with their target, but they couldn't access Mr. Akpan's past school records, and that was how he missed this big opportunity.

Why am I telling you this story, and what lesson can you take from this as private school owner?

The most important thing I want you to take from this story is the importance of keeping records of your school in a safe place.

Again, I want you to know that the register book, paper bills, paper forms, Microsoft Excel on your computer, etc., that you are using to keep records in your school are not safe and reliable simply because they can get missing and damaged just like how Mr. Akpan's school got burnt, and he missed a big opportunity.

But wait.

Why is it even important that you, as a private school owner, should keep records of your school?.

As a private school owner, you keep records of your school for two fundamental reasons:

Decision-making
As a private school owner, you use these records to make decisions.

For example, when you look at the number of students who are owing, you will decide to start calling them until they pay.

Stewardship
As a private school owner, you are a steward unto yourself and several other parties. There are other parties who expect you to keep records. Do you know that there's a fine of 2500 if the taxman discovers you have no records?

The taxman, government, CAC, regulators, investors, money lenders, banks, your suppliers, parents of students, etc., all expect you to keep records.

Where then is the safe and secured place to keep records of your school?

The best safe place to keep your school records is in cloud technology tools.

Cloud technology tools are just like your Facebook account, Gmail account, Instagram account, etc.

The most interesting part is that some of these tools are 100% free and the ones that are not free are very affordable.

The reason why you should keep records of your school in cloud technology tools is because of the following:

You can access all your school records on your phone or computer and at any place and time.

You can download all your school transactions and use them for any purpose. In other words, the data can be extracted and used for any purpose.

Your school records cannot get missing, damaged, or crashed.

Your school is open to grants, loans, and bigger opportunities.

You can collaborate with your staff. This means that you and your staff can be entering data, and it will be entering into the same place at the same time.

There are different cloud technology tools available for you as a private school owner, but it depends on what you are trying to achieve.

I will be sharing some of these tools in my next post, but I hope you took something out from these post.

Before i forget , my name is Adeleke Femi David and i help private school owners save cost, stay within their budget, save time and increase their profits using cloud technology tools. My contact details are on my profile or call it signature.

Thank you for reading.

Till i write again