The Challenge

Cleeve School is a large secondary school in Bishop’s Cleeve, Gloucestershire where ICT has always been a vital part of learning. Since the 6th Form student laptop scheme in 2004, the school has been investing in new technologies that can help to achieve personalised learning. Every student has their own individual email, and is able to access ICT facilities during lunchtime and after school. Pupils are also being offered increasing access to school resources from home. They are also encouraged to participate in national competitions such as Smiths Aerospace ‘Flying Challenge’, Lego Robotics and The Crest Awards. In 2007 the school received the ICT Innovation Award sponsored by Oracle Education Foundation.

In 2010 the school were planning a significant new building to house the IT, music and science departments. It was also to house a new communications room to link to IT learning devices and communication tools throughout the building and back to the main school. They needed a partner to work with their own IT team to specify, design and build a progressive communication system with the power and flexibility for the school’s needs now and into the future.

The Solution

GBE Converge quickly established a specification with the schools IT team, then helped source and install the complete communications system. The main communications room at the centre of the development is linked with OM2 fibre to two satellite cabinets. This communications room also has fibre link back to the server room in the old school. Each cabinet had Procurve Ethernet switches installed without PoE for cabled connections or with PoE for the wireless.

Within the stylish new building, the structured cabling supports 225 staff VLAN/secure and over 1600 students. The learning needs of the school are now supported by 33 x Hitachi CPX projectors, 10 x 42”LCD LG screens, whiteboards, laptops, Apple Macs, all wired to the network. This is overlaid with the ARUBA Wireless Network with 55 wireless access points (WAP).