Doncaster College puts audio-visual solutions at the hub of its vision for delivering education

Customer challenge

Doncaster College is at the heart of a ground-breaking project, known as Doncaster Education City, which will revolutionise the delivery of education in South Yorkshire. One of the project's key objectives is to provide flexible learning to encourage more people into further education. To help achieve this goal, and enhance communication with staff and students, Doncaster College decided to deploy a digital signage solution and state-of-the-art multimedia facilities at its new campus, The Hub.

Computacenter solution

The college partnered with Computacenter to ensure that the deployment – which would also involve procuring, designing, testing and installing an entire new ICT infrastructure – was delivered on time. More than 200 projectors were installed, along with 30 screens that are configured to display information streamed from a central database. As the new campus was already in use by staff, the majority of the technology was installed out of hours to minimise disruption to the college's operational activities.

Results

As a result of the project, Doncaster College is able to provide interactive and flexible learning in line with its objectives, which it hopes will make further education accessible to a wider audience. Additionally, the college's digital signage solution provides an effective and simple communication tool, while the provision of multimedia classroom technologies will improve teaching efficiency and quality.

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Customer profile

Providing ground-breaking education services
Doncaster Education City is a ground-breaking £65 million initiative that will transform learning in South Yorkshire and beyond. Designed to provide students with a flexible and inspirational learning experience, the project is being spearheaded by Doncaster College, which provides further and higher education to 20,000 people every year.

The college offers a diverse range of full and part-time courses – from GCSEs and A-levels to apprenticeships, undergraduate and postgraduate degrees and professional studies. Its mission statement is to meet learner needs and aspire to excellence.

Business challenge

Encouraging more people into further education
As part of the Doncaster Education City project, the college moved to a striking new facility in September 2006. Appropriately named The Hub, the building – and its IT systems – will be central to delivering the future vision for education in the city. As Graeme Tizard, IT Director for Doncaster College, explains: "One of our key objectives is to provide flexible learning styles that encourage more people into further education. We therefore need an IT infrastructure that supports both virtual and interactive learning and the deployment of new technologies."

As well as ensuring it could maximise the potential of multimedia content and state-of-the-art teaching tools, the college also wanted to improve communication with students, staff and visitors on the campus. "With thousands of people passing through The Hub each day, we decided to deploy a digital signage system to help us convey important information and messages quickly and effectively," says Graeme.

Computacenter solution

Virtual and interactive technologies
Deploying a digital signage solution and audio-visual technologies, however, was just the tip of the iceberg. The college also needed to source, design, test and install an entire new ICT infrastructure for The Hub – from the datacenter through to the desktop.

To help cope with this complexity, the college enlisted the help of Computacenter. "We needed an ICT partner that understood the complexities associated with delivering a multi-vendor, multi-technology solution within challenging timescales and a limited budget," comments Graeme.

The audio-visual and digital signage solution alone involved implementing more than 250 devices from three different vendors – and all in a very tight timescale. All the equipment had to be operational for when the college opened its doors for the new term. However, as the college was already being used by administration and teaching staff, Computacenter had to ensure that it minimised any disruption to day-to-day operations.

As a result, the majority of the systems were installed out of hours – this included the 200-plus HP projectors, which will be used in The Hub's classrooms alongside web-enabled desktops. Computacenter also played a key role in installing and integrating the digital signage solution. This involved rolling out five new servers and software to support the delivery of content from multiple sources.

"The solution has been specifically configured to enable us to take content from our central databases and stream this to the 30 display screens situated around the campus," comments Graeme. "We can also screen content from TV channels and intelligently manage when information is displayed, which helps simplify IT support. For example the restaurant menu will be featured in the run-up to lunch and then automatically replaced with notices or general information."

Results

Delivering the vision for flexible learning
With its ICT foundations now in place, Doncaster College hopes to eventually expand its use of audio-visual technology to shared areas, such as the lecture theatre, drama studio, events hall and nail bar.

"Audio-visual technology has a massive role to play in the operational efficiency of the college and the delivery of education services," comments Graeme.
Doncaster Education City is part of a wider regeneration plan for the area and is one of the most exciting education and training initiatives in the UK today. As a result of the implementation, Doncaster Education City will be able to enjoy a number of benefits, including:

Flexible and interactive learning environment: The new technology will transform the way people in Doncaster receive education and open up learning to a wider audience.

Improved communication with staff and students: The digital signage solution enables the college to convey important information in a timely and effective manner.

Enhanced efficiency: By providing easy-to-use and reliable classroom technologies, Doncaster College is able to improve the efficiency of its teaching staff.

Computacenter and its audio-visual team will continue to play a part in this transformation, as Graeme explains: "Computacenter played an important role in helping us achieve our goals and will remain a key partner as we continue to develop Doncaster's Education City.