Wireless Networks for Marlborough School

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The Challenge

In January 2001, an Ofsted inspection and report of Marlborough School recommended an increase in the use of ICT.

“The question of how to improve ICT was key for the school governors and so I made a point of looking into how best to spend the budget we had for improvements. The choice was between putting in stand-alone PCs or finding a better way to use the space and resources. After a conversation with the headteacher of another school that had implemented a wireless network using laptops, I decided to look into WiFi as an option. Our head of science went to look at how the solution worked and returned with a recommendation that we also go down the wireless route,” continues Mr Harty.

The majority of schoolrooms are not designed to house PCs. At Marlborough, the old science lab to be renovated into a modern ICT teaching room had the capacity for a maximum of twenty workstations – each taking up a permanent amount of space and preventing the room from being used for anything else. Mr Harty explains:

“There is a tyranny about sitting in front of a PC which makes you feel you have to use them all the time, even if they are only relevant to part of the lesson. It does seem odd to say that a room full of stand-alone PCs is limiting, but that really can be the case. Teachers need to be able to draw on a number of different teaching methods from good old-fashioned board work and text book exercises to watching videos and using the Internet.”

The Solution

Instead of installing rows of stand-alone PCs, Marlborough School decided to equip its new laboratories with laptop computers and a 22Mb per second wireless LAN from U.S. Robotics. The solution comprises an USR2240 access point wirelessly connecting 15 laptops (containing USR 2210 PC cards) to the school’s Curriculum Server, the Internet and a printer. Installation, which took place in September 2002, was completed very quickly by the school’s own ICT network manager and maintenance team, taking only two hours for the wireless link to be set up and the PC cards to be slotted into each laptop.

When the students arrive for their lesson, they each pick-up a laptop from the trolley by the door and choose to sit wherever they wish as they are no longer constrained by the position of PCs that have to be plugged into fixed cable network points. So long as the health and safety issues of other practical equipment is taken into account, the laptops can be used in all areas of the classroom and science department as the WLAN has a range of up to 90 metres.

“The U.S. Robotics wireless system means that technology can now be integrated into the lesson instead of the lesson centering around the technology, providing a much more flexible approach to teaching and learning. Lesson plans are no longer constrained by the physicality of the classroom – laptop use fits in with watching a presentation, then some board work, then back to the internet – the teachers are able to make the technology suit their needs and the potential for enhancing the learning experience is much greater,” says Mr Harty.

Using the laptops, students have immediate access to the Internet and the use of sites such as the BBC’s GCSE Bitesize as useful whole class starter or plenary sessions. The range of resources on the Internet can also be accessed at the click of a button to exemplify the use of a scientific concept in the everyday world such as real-time satellite or planetary data from the NASA website, or to provide visual and auditory stimulation. Online learning facilities are also useful tools for revision and research purposes. PowerPoint presentations are also used and are a useful tool that enable detailed lessons to be prepared in advance and then saved and differentiated to students’ learning styles and needs and interactive PowerPoint presentations enable student and class interaction.

The Benefits

The new wireless system has brought a true multimedia experience to the students. Whereas before, time would be lost in moving students on mass across a classroom to where PCs were situated and back again to be able to do text book and board work, the wireless LAN and laptops now mean that the students don’t have to move about. Marlborough School has found this much more efficient and maximum use is made out of the classroom.

“The U. S. Robotics wireless solutions is simple and effective and I would like to extend it to other areas of the school following discussions with teachers and students about the best way to use the resources. "

“I truly believe that teaching and learning opportunities are far greater now that we have a wireless LAN in the school. I recently attended a course for headteachers facilitated by the National College of School Leadership and found other headteachers very interested in the solution we had implemented at Marlborough. I hope other schools and colleges are able to follow us down the wireless route,” Mr Harty concludes.

A further vision for the future, with the increased deployment of wireless hotspots around the UK, is the possibility of taking laptops on fieldtrips – for example to the Natural History Museum. If the museum and other such institutions installed hotspots, then teachers could break up the day out with an interactive session on the laptops further adding to the multimedia learning experience.

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