Civica has announced that it has delivered the first phase of the Building Schools for the Future (BSF) project in Sheffield and the pre-BSF schools infrastructure project for Essex County Council. The company is the ICT partner for Sheffield's BSF Programme and has helped Yewlands Technology College to open on time and with a new ICT Managed Learning Environment (MLE) and Managed Service for over 1,000 pupils and staff. The college is the first local school in the programme.
'The benefits of the new MLE and managed service are enormous, 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,' said Angela Armytage, headteacher at Yewlands School & Technology College. The MLE integrates a number of applications that utilise Microsoft Learning Gateway and SharePoint 2007 technologies, Plus Vista and Office 2007. The central database is now linked with other systems such as Capita SIMS, Electronic Registration, CCTV and Access Control.
Civica has also installed a number if its own products throughout the system, such as Icon and Spydus Library Management System, which automates schools library services. The project is led by the Local Education Partnership, comprising Sheffield City Council, Partnerships for Schools and Taylor Woodrow Construction.
Civica has also helped Essex County Council to employ a new IT infrastructure, which will have 500,000 users. The company says it is one of the biggest installations of its type in education. Seventy secondary schools and 450 primary schools across the county will benefit from the system. The system is called Essex Schools' Collaboration Infrastructure (ESCI) and has been given the delightful moniker of ESCIMO by staff and students.
