Services that matter

Annual report of the Department of Service & Innovation 2024

Department of Education & Youth

The Department of Education & Youth provides children and families in the city with comprehensive school and recreational services in preschools and primary schools, after-school programs, youth centers, school bands and other institutions in all city neighborhoods.

During the year, work continued on coordinating solutions, simplifying services and providing clearer oversight of data and applications. It's worth noting that at the City's management day in fall 2024, a presentation was held on the department's digital growth.

Web projects gain momentum

  • New primary school websites went live during the year. The sites are now available on reykjavik.is with a consistent design that follows the City's design system. Key school staff received website management training, with extensive support from the Department of Service & Innovation's web team.
Illustration of people working together at a table.

Preschool matters and changes at Vala

  • The Preschool Admission Tracker launched in January and was introduced in March. It helps parents make decisions about preschool openings, especially regarding spring allocation.
  • The preschool priority application was moved to My Pages. Parents now submit certificates and data electronically through the service portal instead of printing and mailing them.
  • New contracts with private preschools ensure that all applications now go through Vala. Openings are therefore allocated through the same system, whether for City-run or private preschools. Implementation was still underway at year-end.
  • Vala's school solutions were sold from Advania to InfoMentor during the year. This affected the procurement procedure for a new management system for preschools, recreational activities and school meals that was already underway, so negotiations were halted.
  • Work focused on migrating data from Vala to the City's data warehouse. The sale of Vala delayed the project's progress and it is therefore not complete.

New systems and streamlined services

During the year, work focused on implementing and developing new systems that support daily operations of school and recreational activities and improve oversight and safety.

  • Following a competitive bidding process, the kitchen management system Matthildur was purchased
  • Wired Relations was implemented to manage processing agreements, and a workshop was held for stakeholders during implementation.
  • Many children apply for work with Reykjavík’s School of Work during the summer. Since the contract for the previous system was expiring, a decision was made to implement the Vala School of Work system from InfoMentor after analysis. The implementation took place in 2024, and the system will be used for registration in summer 2025.
  • A new MDM system, Jamf, was adopted for tablet management and replaced the older solution, Lightspeed, after a successful pilot project.
  • Following analysis and bidding, implementation of the Abler registration system for the city’s youth centers began. The goal is to improve event registration and management, reduce manual work and simplify financial settlement. The system will also allow direct payment collection for event costs.
  • In May, a digital solution product manager for school and recreational activities started work. This person works closely with Mixtúra and the department's digital transformation lead.

New service processes and forms for day parents

A decision was made to start a new project to improve services for day parents and those who use their services.

The project includes developing simpler solutions for applications for preschool priority, establishment grants for childcare, subsidies for placement, day parent emergency buttons and operations in non-residential facilities.

This project will begin in 2025.

Illustration of two children examining a spider at preschool.

Implementation of Búi

  • We are implementing Búi working with centers, schools, the Hlaðan team and the system implementation team. The main focus has been on authentication issues and technical preparation.
  • Setting up a new environment for the City's products has delayed the system's release and errors that occurred must be fixed before proceeding. Implementation is expected to begin at the East Center once technical issues are resolved.

Project pillars and collaboration with the state

During the year, Department of Education & Youth projects were classified into three pillars: registration projects, work environment projects and educational projects. Project prioritization is based on these pillars and this methodology will continue in the coming quarters.

We also collaborated closely with the Center for Education and School Service on joint solutions related to the new student database, Frigg. Frigg is a shared database of all students in the country.

Development of the Bjargey project was later discontinued, but collaboration ensured that results and next steps were incorporated into Frigg's development, so that Reykjavík City's contribution benefits the comprehensive solution for the entire country.