The School Infrastructure Project is a major project aimed at improving schools network infrastructure over the next 15 months with particular emphasis on active equipment, wireless connectivity and equipment cabinet locations. It builds on the work undertaken as part of previous projects and is key to realising our technical vision which is to give secure and appropriate access to a set of integrated and powerful services dependent on user entitlement but regardless of location and interface.

We have several important aims in undertaking this project:

• To replace legacy hubs and switches, which act as bandwidth bottlenecks on a network, with new, industry standard Cisco equipment
• To optimise school network design to minimise any bottlenecks. This may involve moving some servers to improve routing and speeds
• To review any existing wireless networks and ensure that they comply with security standards so that both the network and children’s data is secure
• To check that adequate network access is available and where it isn’t to explore, within constraints, appropriate local solutions including wireless
• Where a school’s network infrastructure has grown beyond the capacity of its wiring cabinet, to replace the old cabinet with a new one.

The project will be funded via two routes. The retained National Digital infrastructure Grant (121) will be supporting the project to the tune of £1.2M. Service Birmingham has made available a considerable amount of highly specified current Cisco equipment which has been recently recovered from the City Council’s corporate network. This ensures the City’s assets are being responsibly managed and recycled, in this case, to the benefit of schools.

We anticipate that, in the first instance, the main beneficiaries of the project will be Primary and Special schools along with those Nursery Schools not due to become Children’s Centres. Secondary Schools will have the option to benefit in phase 3 of the project, which we anticipate will be next year.

The Project

The project will be rolled out across the city and for logistical reasons schools applications will be processed in groups depending on when we receive the completed application. The project will have three stages:

• The first stage will be a simple questionnaire where schools can opt into the project. Schools that complete the questionnaire will then be allocated a place in the waiting list.
• The second stage will involve a network audit by an external agency to determine the school’s needs. If the project is unable to fund the full extent of the work recommended we will fund the most urgent areas and give the school a copy of the information enabling it to be fed into any future development plans
• The third stage of the project will involve the installation and configuration of new equipment in the school.

We anticipate the process from questionnaire to installation to be between 8 and 12 weeks, this will largely be dependent on a school’s ability to accommodate the installation dates.

We are currently in the process of identifying a suitable supplier and aim to start the Pilot in May.

The questionnaire and the completion guidelines are here .