Essex County CouncilSchools Broadband Services
Report by Tracey KelsbieContact details [email protected]
Schools Forum Agenda Item 12Date: 22nd October 2014
Background1. Purpose of report
The purpose of the report is to provide the summary of the value for money report for Schools Forum.
2. Recommendations
We continue with our current supplier (DUCL). Education are currently reviewing the pricing structure for charging both LA controlled schools and academies for 2015/16 and report back to Schools Forum in December.
3. Background
In the schools forum meeting it was agreed that the centralised funding for schools broadband would be accepted for 2014/15 and supplementary information would be provided to schools forum which would include a value for money benchmarking report for schools broadband. Following is a summary of the report.
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Value for Money Report SummaryCurrent Service Packaged Offerings for the Essex Schools Broadband Service
Internet Service Provision (10mb Primary/Special and 100Mb SecondaryInternet filtering to PAS74 standard and age appropriate servicesTransparent Proxy Internet Filtering ServiceVirus Protection for School EquipmentDomain Name Services (DNS)Simple Message Transport system with spam protection (SMTP)Firewall Services – To protect schools from the InternetPublic IP Address management for school servicesConnection to JAnet service for educationVideo Conferencing Core serviceWeb Hosting for school websitesSecure Connectivity to Essex Council Services for schoolsSecure Encrypted Backup system for finance and confidential dataHelpdesk support 24x7 and automated monitoring of the networkFully Managed Service for Schools
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Benchmarking Control Criteria
Schools Selected
Primary School Rural
Great Sampford PrimaryFinchingfield RoadGreat SampfordEssex
Primary School Urban
White Court SchoolEnnerdale AvenueGreat NotleyBraintree
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Secondary School
Davenant Foundation SchoolChester RoadLoughtonEssex
Special School
Marketfield SchoolSchool RoadElmstead MarketColchester
Current Price Breakdown
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The service provided to the school is a 10Mb Internet service complete withall of the options detailed on the Current Service Offerings Slide. 107 PupilsCost DUCL: £10,584 Alternative 3rd Party Supplier : £11,778
Current Price Breakdown
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The service provided to the school is a 10Mb Internet service complete withall of the options detailed on the Current Service Offerings Slide. 588 PupilsCost DUCL: £3,928 Alternative 3rd Party Supplier: £6,702
Current Price Breakdown
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The service provided to the school is a 100Mb Internet service complete withall of the options detailed on the Current Service Offerings Slide. 1168 PupilsCost DUCL: £17,249 Alternative 3rd Party Supplier: £17,413
Davenant Foundation School
Current Price Breakdown
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The service provided to the school is a 10Mb Internet service complete withall of the options detailed on the Current Service Offerings Slide. 185 PupilsCost DUCL: £4,203.76 Alternative 3rd Party Supplier: £6,702
Marketfield School
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Conclusion
To highlight some of the major benefits that schools receive from this Service :
• Value for Money for this service when compared to an alternative 3rd Party Supplier;• Dedicated schools helpdesk focused on first time fix with experienced staff over a wide range of services;• Strict SLAs for response and fix times;• A private network with little contention;• 2 x resilient data centres providing mission critical access to the internet and hosted services;• 99.99% availability proven track record;• Focused account management and marketing resource e.g. termly newsletters;• Excellent security with yearly security penetration testing conducted to protect schools;• Economies of scale to provide advanced technologies to schools.
Next Steps:-
• Presentation to the Schools Forum Meeting In December to seek funding for 15/16;• Review of service package to potentially remove little used services (Video Conferencing) and provision• Alternative services being requested by schools (Cloud back-ups).