Marnix Academy Utrecht trains over 1,300 students to become future primary school teachers. The University of Applied Sciences collaborates closely with more than 360 primary schools in the region. Together, they form a partnership — Partners in Education and Development — where the responsibility for student training is shared.
This collaboration is invaluable but also complex: placing, guiding, and assessing students must be handled with care and structure.
Program leader Jessica Kuiper, former functional administrator and education consultant Tim Bossinade, and current administrator Joris Leistra explain how they manage this with OnStage.
The challenge: gaining control over a complex placement process
Each year, placing students is a large-scale operation for Marnix Academy. Every February, partner schools start entering their school profiles in OnStage. Jessica explains:
“Schools fill out a profile in OnStage, describing not only their educational philosophy and mission but also the number of available internship positions. Second- and third-year students can view these profiles in March and choose a school that aligns with their learning path, in consultation with their study coach and school-based mentor. Following that, the Partner Schools Fair takes place, where hundreds of schools and their students gather. Students then submit their top three choices, and the complex matching puzzle begins.”
That puzzle is far from simple.
“The biggest challenge is finding the right match and ensuring a fair distribution across all partner schools,” Jessica says.
“Students must also demonstrate diversity during their training — not four years at the same type of school, but experience in different contexts: city and village, large and small schools, or specific teaching approaches such as Montessori or Jenaplan. Meanwhile, we must also reserve placements for first-year students, whom we assign manually based on travel distance. Fourth-year students have more freedom — they apply for placements themselves, supported by OnStage.”
There was also a second challenge: the systems.
“Before OnStage, we used a custom-built solution that perfectly matched our processes,” Jessica explains. “It worked well but became financially unsustainable. We had to move to a standard system — without losing our own way of working. The question was: can we find a platform flexible enough to support our processes, rather than forcing us to adapt to it?”
The solution: flexibility and collaboration in OnStage
After exploring several systems, Marnix Academy chose OnStage in 2018.
“The decisive factor was that our entire process — from school profiles to preferences and matching — could be built within OnStage,” says Jessica. “That allowed us to retain the core of our placement system: students and schools meet, there’s freedom of choice, and we aim for the best possible match.”
Implementation, however, came with challenges.
“Hundreds of users had to log in — teachers, institutional trainers, and schools,” Jessica recalls. “In the early years, we ran into minor issues — terminology, unclear user rights — but we solved them step by step with clear instructions and guidance. In the end, the system proved flexible enough to grow with us.”
Tim adds:
“Initially, institutional trainers had broad rights in the system to place students, but that also made it vulnerable. Changes weren’t always applied consistently, which led to messy data. Students who dropped out or switched schools, or new records created manually, caused duplicates and errors.”
To address this, a major cleanup was undertaken: open records were archived, processes were restructured, and new fields were added.
“We also scheduled fixed moments to check data,” says Joris. “Twice a year, we run OnStage reports with our Bureau Samen Opleiden team. That way, any inconsistencies are spotted and corrected in time, keeping the system clean and the workload manageable.”
The result: more control and stronger collaboration
Thanks to OnStage, Marnix Academy now has far more overview and control.
“We have a real-time overview of all partner schools and students placed there,” says Jessica. “That’s crucial, especially now that funding structures are changing and we need to know exactly who is placed where. OnStage provides that transparency — as long as we maintain it carefully. That’s exactly what we need.”
“Since we cleaned up the records and streamlined the process, it’s much easier to track changes,” Joris adds. “That builds confidence and saves a lot of time.”
OnStage also strengthens collaboration between the university and partner schools.
“It makes communication more structured and ensures that everyone — from institutional trainer to school-based mentor — can fulfill their role,” Jessica notes.
The results are clear: while there was a learning curve at first, administrators, teachers, and mentors now find OnStage intuitive and logical.
“Because the core of the system is so simple — creating groups, linking students, placing them — everyone gets the hang of it quickly.”
Jessica concludes:
“OnStage evolves with us. Whether it’s a new curriculum or the introduction of regional education networks, we can adapt the system accordingly. That makes OnStage not just a tool, but a genuine partner in our practice-based education process. It helps us strengthen the bridge between study and practice — and that’s what ultimately matters most.”