WEB AND VIDEO CONFERENCING HITS THE BOOKS

The Government has ambitious plans to have broadband internet access installed in every school across the UK by 2006. The minimum accepted speed is 2Mbs with secondary schools ideally being connected at 8Mbs or higher. Ten regional broadband consortia (RBCs) have been established to manage the process across the country and by working together they are already well on the way to meeting their deadline. Bruce Withington looks at the new possibilities being opened up to schools supplied by the London Grid for Learning (LGfL) with the introduction of this new resource.

Providing every school in the UK with Broadband access is a huge and daunting task, but beyond that the RBC’s (regional broadband consortia) are looking ahead to establish how schools can make the most of this new resource. Working with eight out of the ten RBCs, First Virtual Communications and its partners are supplying schools with state of the art web conferencing solutions. London Grid for Learning (LGfL) is currently piloting the Click to Meet web conferencing solution with a view to making it available to all 2600 schools that fall under its catchment area.

LGfL is keen to ensure that the new broadband resource is used as extensively as possible by the schools it represents, and has been talking to schools and other RBCs about how to best realise the full potential of broadband access. Web conferencing was one of the major options suggested as a way of expanding on existing resources and creating new opportunities for learning.

LGfL reviewed the web and video conferencing market in terms of hardware and software to identify what was available to meet their specifications. The successful scheme had to be wide ranging, and included diverse requirements and objectives. For example, the solution had to be easy to set up and operate from an end user point of view, without requiring a technician to be on site whenever the conferencing tools were used.
It was also felt that if the solution was too complicated, teachers and students would be deterred from using it. The priority for the schools and LEAs was for the new solution to be easily integrated with any existing video conferencing equipment to be able to integrate with the LGfL’s existing portal.

Ian Lehmann, Operations Manager at LGfL, explains that considerations also had to be made regarding the way that web and video conferencing is used in the education sector:
“Staff and students across the education sector will use web conferencing in a very different way to the corporate sector. We are dealing with a much larger number of users. For example, we may be bringing together between 80 and 100 people in four to five different locations, which is a completely different ball game compared to a 10 person, online corporate meeting. The quality issue is also vital, as children won’t accept low quality technology in this day and age, and require a solution that provides an immediate response.”

He added, “One of the challenges we faced is that we have to provide this solution for 33 local authorities, all working in different ways, all with different firewalls. However, possibly even more importantly, the solution had to offer NAT/PAT traversal. We had to find a solution that could encompass this set up – and Click to Meet was able to meet that requirement easily.”

The core Click to Meet web and video conferencing solution provides a number of services which are available for the schools in the LGfL region to trial. By using the installed on demand web-based Conference Client, virtually any PC user with an IP connection is able to attend on-line web conferences through the LGfL. Online conferences provide users with the ability to make high quality web conferencing calls free of charge across the LGfL network between two or more conferencing units. This enables resources to be shared economically and offers realistic, cost-effective distance learning tools.

Since the pilot began, the LGfL steering group has approved the use of Click to Meet for external calls. Any school using the solution is able to invite teachers, governors or pupils from any internet connected school or museum across the world to join them in a free conference. This opens up a vast array of opportunities with the potential for language classes to link directly to foreign schools, history classes to link to heritage museums, science classes to link with natural history museums, the possibilities are boundless. First Virtual Communications is currently in discussion with some of the UK’s leading museums in the hope of developing a partnership with LGfL and the other RBCs with which it works.

Combining high quality multipoint audio and video with web collaboration tools such as document sharing, presentation, file transfer and whiteboard, all within a single web browser interface, Click to Meet maintains the expressive and interactive communications that are critical in learning environments. Flexible screen layouts and mode options allow a variety of screen displays to be created which will suit a wide range of lesson requirements. A directory service within the solution allows the user to make calls easily without the need to code in long strings or telephone numbers. Scheduling tools can also be incorporated into the system so that conferences can be booked in advance of lessons if necessary.

Part of the consultation process that LGfL has gone through with the schools has involved helping them set up the right environment for delivering education through web conferencing.

Ian Lehmann added, “The important thing is to create confidence in the teachers so that they feel like Click to Meet is just another tool to aid them with their classes. We want using web conferencing to be a natural addition to the chalkboard, the whiteboard and the interactive whiteboard. I think that in time this will happen. We need to support the schools in this, because it will allow teachers and students to make the most of resources available to them, presenting opportunities that we could never have dreamt of when we were at school.”

ENDS