Creating secure, seamless, sustainable and connected experiences for all at The Aurora Group

Summary

Established in 2015, The Aurora Group (Aurora) has grown to become the UK’s sixth largest provider of education, care and support for children, young people and adults with specialist educational needs and disabilities (SEND).

Secure connectivity is a must have for delivering the innovative digital learning and engagement experiences the Group is renowned for. It’s also vital for powering the smooth day-to-day operation of its schools and enabling the collaboration and communications on which teachers, staff and administrators depend.

Aurora wanted to elevate communication capabilities for all its stakeholders. Implementing an integrated cloud-managed WAN/LAN platform would enable it to streamline operations, simplify support delivery, futureproof capabilities, and deliver the intelligent data needed to support more informed decision making.

The Requirement

Over the years the Group’s IT infrastructure had evolved and grown in complexity as more and more schools joined its network. This in turn created significant technical support challenges that made it hard to detect, analyse or resolve network problems, as Marc Nelson, Group IT Manager at The Aurora Group explains.

“Initially we had regional tech personnel assigned to individual schools who frequently had to go on-site to resolve network issues. Each school had its own unique set up, a scenario that was further complicated by the variety of different vendor technologies deployed to handle switching, wireless and routing. It wasn’t unusual for engineering changes – including a patch or upgrade – to trigger a later network failure – which in turn necessitated a further service visit and unhappy users,” he says.

Alongside making it difficult to efficiently co-ordinate and manage support resources, the plethora of different setups and vendor technologies involved meant that not all engineers had the pre-requisite know-how needed to solve problems when they arrived on site. It was also difficult for engineers to share their learnings to other team members.

“We took the decision to upgrade our IT infrastructure and unify the three separate siloed networks – wireless, switching and routing – at each school onto a single platform. This would reduce the complexity that was generating many of the issues we were firefighting on a daily basis and the need to undertake so many onsite fixes,” continues Marc Nelson.

Having evaluated a range of solutions, the decision was taken to implement a Cisco Meraki WAN/LAN platform. Easy to implement and allowing for proactive issue management and efficient troubleshooting, the Cisco Meraki solution would enable Marc Nelson’s team to centrally manage all schools from a single dashboard.

“Once we’d specified our preferred technology solution, we turned to Camworth to provide the expertise and support we needed to define and scope the multi-site network design for our new infrastructure and support us with procurement,” explains Marc Nelson.

Camworth’s contributions to the initial scoping and design stage proved vital for gaining the all-important project approval from The Aurora Group’s Board of Directors. In addition to providing the technical insights they needed to create a secure, sustainable, optimised and future ready WAN/LAN network, Camworth’s deep relationship with Cisco ensured Aurora got the solution it wanted at a value-add price. It also enabled Aurora to take advantage of Cisco’s Capital Finance scheme and structure a three-year purchasing payment plan for its new enterprise-grade network.

“With Camworth’s help we were able to convince the Board that our future communications vision and roadmap would enhance and futureproof our operational capabilities, reduce our operational costs – with significant savings in annual licensing costs alone – and enable a more efficient and effective support model for our schools,” says Marc.

The Solution

• Design and configure a tailored Cisco Meraki WAN/LAN solution.
• Procurement and a flexible payment plan.
• Professional services – multi-site design, commercial advice and guidance.

Pre-implementation

Camworth’s professional services team worked hand-in-glove with Aurora to ensure the solution design met all the unique needs of the Group’s distributed school operations.

“Camworth applied significant expertise and know-how to defining the best solution and pricing models for our needs. Their knowledge and relationship with Cisco ensured we were able to tap into the best possible deals. It also opened the door to us participating in Cisco’s Schools Showcase programme, which enables us to learn and share experiences with other schools in this community,” says Marc Nelson.

To ensure that every aspect of the implementation requirement was covered, Camworth took care to ensure Aurora could make full use of its new technology investment. “Camworth organised a training programme to ensure our teams would be able to manage the system effectively and fully utilise all the new functionality at their fingertips,” confirms Marc Nelson.

Having undertaken all pre-site technical builds and testing, Camworth ensured that Marc and his team were able to undertake a fault-free implementation.

“Camworth’s expertise proved the ideal complement to our own knowledge, and they went the extra mile to help us resolve problems. Their commitment to our success, together with the ability to provide professional services and training guidance, made a significant difference and helped us transition smoothly,” explains Marc Nelson.

Outcomes

Implementing the new Meraki platform has enabled Aurora to standardise its networks across all schools and simplify day-to-day management and support tasks. As a result, engineering teams can now manage multiple SSIDs and allocate resources much more efficiently to improve overall network performance.

“The platform’s intuitive design and centralised management capabilities have exceeded our expectations. Plus, the new system has enabled us to create a dedicated infrastructure team that handles larger network issues, leaving our support team to focus on operational tasks. This separation of responsibilities has significantly streamlined our operations and improved our overall efficiency and responsiveness to users,” states Marc Nelson.

The powerful yet simplified infrastructure means there are fewer network related support calls and connectivity issues can be rapidly diagnosed to determine if users are experiencing a network or device related issue. Importantly, the new solution is enabling the Group to pursue its broader sustainability goals.

“Switching to a more sustainable solution with a longer lifecycle means we’ve eliminated the need for frequent hardware replacements that in turn generates landfill waste – something that aligns with our net-zero and sustainability goals,” says Marc Nelson.

The new Cisco Meraki solution has also enabled the Group to elevate its safeguarding and data protection capabilities. Today, the central infrastructure team can remotely monitor social media use and other activities users undertake on the network.

“Meraki gives us the ability to gain deep insights into how applications and devices are being used and apply and enforce granular safeguarding and data protection policies – something that is critical for remaining vigilant where our duty of care responsibilities for vulnerable children and young people are concerned,” continues Marc Nelson.

Looking ahead, Marc Nelson wants to go beyond simply utilising the new Cisco Meraki environment to manage online and physical protections – like access onto its school sites.

“We’re currently evaluating how we could use IoT sensors to monitor classroom air quality and energy consumption at our schools to further boost their sustainability and operational efficiency. We’re also exploring how Cisco Umbrella will enable us to elevate device security for remote users. Most exciting of all, we’d like to trial an innovative ‘smart school’ site and discover ways to enhance the learning experience while making school workflows more efficient,” confirms Marc Nelson.

Customer Experience

“We’re very much looking forward to helping Aurora to leverage the capabilities of Cisco Meraki’s intelligent tools technologies as it prepares to push ahead with its first ‘Smart Schools’ project. We will be with them every step of the way as they look to transform building operations, improve comfort and safety for staff and students and advance their sustainability credentials.”
STUART SPAIN, HEAD OF TECHNOLOGY AND SERVICE DELIVERY AT CAMWORTH.