Home Case Studies Sir William Perkins's School Sir William Perkins's School

Sir William Perkins's School

Sector: Education

Key Feature: Bespoke Web Applications

Sometimes it really is the simple things that can make the biggest differences to the efficiency of an organisation. In this case it was the need: Timely and effective delivery of messages from parents to constantly-mobile teachers throughout the building. 

“We discovered it was vital that we came up with a way of being able to easily communicate with these 'mobile' staff members. We chose the SpliceCom maximiser because it was an open architecture system that we knew could be developed, adapted and programmed to meet our exact needs”.

Ben Nichols - Director of SpiderGroup - Sub-Contract IT Management Company for Sir William Perkins's School 

Until maximiser arrived, Sir William Perkins's School suffered from, as one member of staff described it, being like 'post-it note city'. When an external caller, usually a parent, needed to speak to a member of the teaching staff they called in to main reception and almost always had to leave a message. With teachers being either in class or simply elsewhere in the building, it was impossible to track them down and get them to the phone straight away. As a result, a message had to be taken and passed on to the teacher asking them to call back. Messages were then generally written on post-it notes and left in various locations such as teachers' desks, in reception, in a teachers pigeonhole in the staff room or anywhere that the receptionists felt gave them the best chance of seeing the message as soon as possible. Most definitely not an ideal solution, but one with no obvious alternative at the time.

Ben Nichols, Director of SpiderGroup, explains further: “The management of the school's IT and communications infrastructure has been outsourced to SpiderGroup since 2003 and we now spend two or three days a week on site managing and supervising their systems”. “When we arrived here first it was immediately clear that they needed a new phone system. The old one was already at capacity, they did not have enough lines available for outgoing calls and they were also facing the possibility of not being able to install phones in the new building extension due to lack of existing wiring. As we investigated further we also discovered that the problem of delivering messages around the school was a real issue for them. It was vital that we came up with a way of being able to easily communicate with these 'mobile' staff members”.

Identifying a solution to a very specific requirement

The IT manager has always been the target of numerous incoming calls from external suppliers wanting to sell phone systems. Having made the decision to look around for a new one it was not long before Ben had about 30 to choose from! Some simple investigation quickly cut this down to three key manufacturers, Mitel, Alcatel and Avaya. Ben met with resellers from all three companies and discovered that the systems offered were basically similar to a certain extent, but that none could really solve the problem of communicating with staff for message-delivery in the way which the school would like. It took further discussion and a more detailed explanation of the schools requirements before it became apparent that there was in fact a perfect solution out there. The Account Manager from the Avaya reseller takes up the story: "There are a number of systems available which would have provided the basic telephony which Sir William Perkins's School required. But more and more we are finding that customers need their communications systems to be that much 'cleverer' and this was no exception. The school has 90 staff, but only 20 have their own desks and many have to share. To communicate properly within the school all staff needed voicemail, and needed to know when messages had been left, but not all had their own phone. Once we understood the school’s requirements better we immediately realised that the SpliceCom maximiser was the answer".

Ben Nichols continues:"We chose the SpliceCom maximiser because it was an open architecture system that we knew could be developed, adapted and programmed to meet our needs - as opposed to an 'off the shelf' solution that would have been installed, configured and left to operate in the same manner as the day it arrived. I could immediately see all sorts of other functionality which could be programmed into maximiser, but our first goal was to find a way of giving every staff member access to their own voicemail box - and then some way of letting them know that messages were there for them. Quite a tall order, but one I knew we could now solve".

A simple answer built on a sophisticated platform

The solution when it came was in fact remarkably simple. As part of the overall system a maximiser PCS 400, which has a large LCD touch screen was installed in the staff room at Sir William Perkins's school. SpiderGroup then wrote a bespoke application in PHP, an open-source programming language, to create a graphical user interface which gave all the information that staff needed about their voicemail boxes. A screen on the PCS 400 in the staff room is shown at all times, giving a list of all staff by name and indicating how many messages each one has in their mailbox. All the staff member has to do is to touch their name on the screen, key in a personal PIN code and then pick up the receiver to listen to their messages. This also frees up the receptionist’s time as when calls come in, all they have to do is put the caller through to the relevant mailbox rather than take a message, write it on a post-it note and then physically take it to the staff room.

Future Developments

SpiderGroup are already working on a number of additional bespoke applications which will make life easer for teachers and will enable better communications with parents. Some of these include:

Class Registration System

This will enable a list of class members to be displayed on the PCS 400 screen. The teacher can then tap the screen to mark a check-box when a student is present. The system will then generate an SMS message which is automatically sent to the parent of any child who is not there and is expected to be - e.g. they are not already off sick or a parent has not already called in.

CCTV Links

Camera images can be shown on the PCS 400 screen at the touch of a button or 'pushed' through with an audible alarm in the case of a gate or door being opened when it should not be. Teachers working late can also check cameras on the screen of the PCS 400 before opening doors to out-of hours visitors.

Ben summarises: “There have been very few niggles with the entire implementation. Overall, we now have a telephone system that will grow with us and one that we can adapt to our needs infinitely. The messaging system is professional as well as being easy to use and staff can get an outside line at any time. Finally, and this is a big issue for all schools, when ensuring pupil security, we will soon have the ability to access images from our CCTV cameras around the school, from any location, to see what is going on”.

Shelia Hallsworth, Marketing Manager for the school, also commented:

“As a member of the administrative staff I sometimes work from home and now I can dial in to collect messages whenever I need to, or I can have calls diverted directly to my home number if I choose. The new maximiser system and the voicemail capability it delivers have been a huge step forward for us”.

 

Project Highlights

The outstanding feature of this implementation is maximiser's ability to be developed to met the exact requirements of the education sector and Sir William Perkins's School specifically. Any business telephone system could have done most of what was required from a telephony perspective but only maximiser was able to solve the exact communications challenges which Ben was facing. And what's even better, now that the applications have been developed, SpiderGroup and SpliceCom are working together to allow other educational establishments to benefit from the same functionality which Sir William Perkins's School are now using on a daily basis.

 

System Summary

  • One 4100 Call Server
  • Two 4315 Phone Modules
  • One 4330 Phone Module
  • IP/analogue combined implementation
  • 30 ISDN channels
  • 19 IP extensions
  • 60 analogue extensions
  • 19 PCS 400 handsets
  • 22 analogue phones
  • PCS 50 software
  • Eight port voicemail with 62 mailboxes
  • Call recording
  • Auto-attendant

 

Commercial Benefits

  • Efficient message distribution to all staff, regardless of working location. 
  • Bespoke functionality to improve other school functions such as registration systems, absence tracking and security monitoring.
  • IP solution took into account lack of previously installed copper in the ground and instead operatesover the existing fibre Gigabit Ethernet LAN to link five cabinets in different buildings.
  • Because a wide range of phone types are available, the school was not limited to deploying expensive IP phones but could instead use a mix of soft phones and plain ordinary telephones.
  • Total re-distribution of external line usage to ensure that staff do not have a problem getting an outside line when they need to return a call.

 

Staff Benefits

  • Efficient distribution of messages to staff via individual mailboxes accessed centrally from any phone.
  • Simple monitoring of messages via PCS 400 screen in staff room.
  • Reduction in time taken to deliver messages, thus freeing up time for reception staff.
  • Remote workers can have incoming calls diverted to their home number or dial in to collect voicemail messages.
  • Useful information such as school timetables or train times can be viewed on the PCS 400 screen.
  • Ability to run a remote-teaching video conferencing system via two 64kbps circuits through the SpliceCom maximiser, enabling more 'fringe' subjects to be taught within the school.
  • Faxes can now be sent from any machine in the school - and incoming faxes can be delivered directly to the relevant email Inbox.

 

Parent Benefits

  • Messages which parents leave for teachers will be received as swiftly as possible.
  • Reception staff time is freed up, allowing them to be more responsive to other calls.
  • Once the registration system is implemented, parents will be immediately notified if their child is not at school.