HP helps Barnwell School improve the learning experience

Barnwell School has selected HP to make the classrooms of the future a reality while meeting time and cost restraints.

A virtualised, centrally managed HP Converged Infrastructure deployed by HP Gold Partner Medhurst will support multiple HP desktops, HP laptops and HP tablets over a wired and wireless HP network, making lessons more interactive and administration easier.

Barnwell School is located south of Stevenage and has approximately 1300 students and 200 staff with future capacity to expand. Barnwell is in the process of consolidating its three campuses into two and will be known as Barnwell Middle School and Barnwell Upper School, involving two campus moves over a two year period so that both campuses will eventually be adjacent to each other.

“To provide the best possible learning environment for students and staff alike, we wanted to take this opportunity to replace our existing IT infrastructure with a more reliable, cost effective solution,” says Tony Fitzpatrick, Head Teacher, Barnwell School. “The expertise of HP and Medhurst in the education sector will enable us to achieve this within tight constraints. The school needs to process and issue GCSE and A-level results during August, and both sites must be operational for September 1st, so all transfer, installation, commissioning and testing of equipment must be done during the five-week summer holiday period. In addition, our budget is limited.”

The HP solution will give Barnwell School’s staff more time and resources to educate and support students. Staff will be able to access everything from teaching applications to roll-call administration.

HP ProLiant DL380 rack-mounted management servers will support 200 HP Compaq Elite 8300 Small Form Factor PCs, 30TB of HP StoreVirtual 4500 Storage will eliminate any single point of failure and ensure that data is always accessible, while a high-speed wireless HP Networking solution will provide flexible, seamless access to applications and services throughout the sites, as well as remote working for staff.

The new HP infrastructure will reduce power usage and hardware footprint, lowering energy costs, and can be scaled to grow seamlessly with Barnwell School’s future requirements.

To ensure maximum IT efficiency and cost-effectiveness, the entire HP infrastructure will be supported by a lifetime warranty with three years Next Business Day on-site service.*

“Barnwell wanted to improve the reliability of its IT infrastructure while introducing more flexibility and scalability,” says Marc Waters, Enterprise Servers Storage and Networking Director, UK&I, HP. “HP’s global experience in the education sector gives the school an achievable, affordable long-term strategy to improve the learning experience through technology.”

*Excluding HP MSM466 wireless APs which have a one-year warranty.