Education Business

Why ADA?
As with any market, the IT needs of the education sector are unique.  With limited budgets available, IT departments within schools, colleges and universities need to be sure they are investing in a reliable, readily expandable infrastructure with a guaranteed service life.  ADA understands these demands and has built an enviable reputation within the education system for vendor impartiality, exacting standards and above all, value.  

Virtualisation
Virtualisation is the term used to describe the process of de-coupling operating systems from the hardware on which they are run. In traditional IT environments where most servers often operate at less than 20% of their capacity, virtualisation provides the ability to consolidate workloads onto fewer physical servers.  Virtualisation can bring similar benefits to desktop infrastructures as well.  The key benefits for each technology being cost reduction, increased security, reduced power consumption and improved redundancy.

Server Virtualisation: Benefits
Consolidation – conservative consolidation ratios of 8:1 mean that 8 virtual servers can operate on 1 physical host.  This allows schools to dramatically reduce their operational IT costs.

Business Continuity – thanks to the portable nature of virtual machines, unexpected downtime is all but eliminated.  Schools can schedule maintenance during normal operating hours with no impact.

Scalability – an inherent part of virtualisation, additional hosts (physical servers) can be added when extra capacity is required.

Desktop Virtualisation: Benefits
Improved Security – as no data is located locally, desktop hardware failures do not result in data loss.  Devices can also be restricted to prevent data being copied to portable memory devices – e.g. USB sticks.

Increased manageability – given all systems are located and managed centrally, ease of maintenance is significantly enhanced as technicians no longer need to visit each machine to update software/operating systems.

Increased Lifespan – because ‘Thin Client’ devices have no moving parts and typically do not process any data, the lifetime of each machine is increased almost indefinitely.

Wi-Fi
Many schools and universities have already realised the numerous benefits that wireless connectivity can bring.  ADA has extensive experience in provisioning new or replacement wireless networks in the higher education sector, designed to improve connectivity, reliability and security.

Although ADA works with a wide range of wireless solution providers, Ruckus is our WLAN partner of choice for deployments within the education sector, due to its robust feature set, greater coverage and its highly competitive price point.

Ruckus Wireless: Benefits
Simple - Simple to setup, deploy and manage.  Ruckus is also readily expandable through a range of compatible devices.

Self Optimising - patented technology which dynamically and continuously analyses and adapts to its environment to deliver a stable and reliable signal.

Unparalleled coverage – signals extend up to 4 times farther than most retail or enterprise WLAN access points.

Secure – state of the art encryption provides 802.1X authentication and intrusion protection.

Shared Storage
With ever changing course material and the increasing need for multimedia intensive applications, storage is becoming an important consideration within the education sector.  ADA works with a number of SAN (Storage Area Network) vendors to deploy solutions which enable institutions to grow their capabilities as requirements change.  Dell EqualLogic’s highly competitive price point and robust feature set has been particularly popular within the education sector.  A Dell Certified Partner, ADA is able to provide end-to-end storage solutions built on EqualLogic platforms.

Dell EqualLogic: Benefits
Scalability – due to the way that Dell EqualLogic creates pools of virtual storage, capacity can be increased by simply adding another iSCSI appliance.

Rapid File Restore –the snapshot capability built into Dell EqualLogic arrays ensures that data can be recovered in seconds.

Cost effective – given Dell EqualLogic is an iSCSI Ethernet based platform, expensive and Fibre based infrastructure can be avoided.

SharePoint (MOSS 2007)
Microsoft SharePoint Server 2007 is a suite of server collaboration platforms which facilitate information-sharing across organisational boundaries (intranet, extranet and internet).  Of specific interest to the education sector, SharePoint meets and exceeds the standards set by the UK Government for eLearning.  

SharePoint Server 2007: Benefits
Flexible tool set - built with flexibility and scalability in mind, SharePoint’s robust portal framework delivers a suite of social computing tools for teachers, pupils and parents (blogs, wikis etc).

Highly configurable - SharePoint’s content management system ensures course materials are made available to specific user groups at the right time.  

Always available - via secure encryption, SharePoint content is available anytime, from anywhere and via any device.

A Microsoft Gold Partner, ADA has helped several schools with SharePoint administration, extensibility and interoperability.  ADA can help with all aspects of SharePoint deployment, including application training, moderator software, 24/7 technical support and ongoing development.

Support Services
Supporting IT environments is one of ADA’s core competencies. Recognising that no two IT environments are the same, ADA offers bespoke technical support solutions from break/fix to proactive support including fully managed IT service contracts.

ADA Support Services: Benefits
Customer focused – tailored solutions to suit each customer’s requirements.

Always open – ADA’s technical support team is available 24 hours a day, 365 days of the year

Pay-as-you-Go – unlike many of our competitors, support time is sold in 15 minute increments not half or full days.

ADA Methodology
By remaining ‘vendor independent’, ADA’s consultative approach ensures learning institutions receive advice they can trust.  ADA routinely provides onsite demonstrations or longer term ‘proof of concept’ pilot programmes to assist schools and universities in choosing the right technology prior to contracted investment.  Furthermore, ADA’s solutions are built around an innovative 0% finance payment model which allows schools and universities to reduce initial capital expenditure by paying over time.  

Next Steps
To find out how ADA’s strategic methodology can help accelerate learning in your environment, call us on 01444 232000.  Alternatively, visit www.ada.co.uk for details of ADA’s programme of education focused events.  These sessions provide an ideal opportunity for schools and universities to share ideas and learn from deployed solutions within the education sector.