Civica delivers first phase of £50m schools projects in Sheffield and Essex

Benefits of new environment are enormous
says headteacher at Yewlands, Sheffield

Civica has delivered the first phase of its Building Schools for the Future (BSF) project in Sheffield, worth nearly £50 million over the next decade, and simultaneously the pre-BSF schools infrastructure project for Essex County Council.

ESCIMO

Civica has helped Essex County Council (ECC) implement a new technology infrastructure with up to 500,000 users registered on the system, one of the biggest installations of its type in the education sector. The platform will be available to 70 secondary schools and 450 primary schools throughout the county.

Called the Essex Schools’ Collaboration Infrastructure (ESCI) and named ESCIMO by the staff and students, Civica has designed, delivered and managed the platform, enabling pupils and staff across the county to share information and collaborate in a secure environment, providing improved communications and access to ICT resources when and where needed. The technology is based on Microsoft’s Learning Gateway framework and supports the development of personalised learning for students, giving them more autonomy over their own study environment, streamlining their learning processes and providing opportunities for reflective learning and target setting.

Purpose-built collaboration websites within the ESCIMO environment also enable collaboration with peer groups and teachers who may be local to each school or in other schools and organisations across the county. Users have a single log-in which provides access to a range of resources, both within ESCI itself and with secure authentication to external study. The technology platform integrates many disparate technology systems that exist in the schools, ensuring that data and learning resources can be shared effectively across the whole school network.

Sheffield

In Sheffield Civica, as the ICT partner for Sheffield City Council’s BSF programme, has helped to ensure that Yewlands Technology College, the first local school in the programme, opened on time and with a new ICT Managed Learning Environment (MLE) and IT managed service for over 1,000 pupils and staff.

The LearnSheffield MLE integrates a number of applications utilising Microsoft Learning Gateway and SharePoint 2007 technologies, plus Vista and Office 2007.  It has linked the central database with other electronic systems such as Capita SIMS, Electronic Registration, CCTV and Access Control. It also incorporates a number of Civica’s own products including the ICON income management system and the SPYDUS library management system, which automates school library services to provide a unique learning experience across Sheffield.

“The benefits of the new MLE and managed service are enormous,” said Angela Armytage, Headteacher at Yewlands School & Technology College. “It is changing the way we communicate, develop teaching and learning and saving leadership time to focus more effectively on our core purpose of raising standards.”
 
Sheffield’s BSF programme is led by the Local Education Partnership comprising Sheffield City Council, Partnerships for Schools and Taylor Woodrow Construction. Civica continues to design, develop and manage the LearnSheffield MLE to help transform Sheffield’s secondary schools whilst delivering best value. The first phase of the project covers nine schools for which the contract value is £10.44 million.

Simon Downing, chief executive of Civica said, “In separate programmes, Civica is helping to provide a modern foundation for learning and collaboration for students, teachers, schools and parents in Sheffield and Essex. We believe both programmes are transforming the educational environment using our new technology platforms, and we are delighted to deliver the real benefits, on the ground, that schools of the future can offer."