David Marlow, Deputy Headteacher of Etz Chaim Boys School explains their digital signage for schools process in his own words.
We moved to new premises in November 2017 and this was a chance for the first time to have a modern computer network installed. As part of our strategic planning we felt the school would really benefit from digital displays in key areas. We felt this would be a beautiful combination of modern technology in terms of mode of communication and spiritual and personal development in terms of the content we could display.
We felt that if we found the right software then we could have a combination of day-long displays – Rewards, Festivals, Students’ Work, Celebrations alongside day-to-day information – changes in teacher, detention lists, timetable alterations, prayer times, homework schedules etc.
I found PresentationPoint alongside other potential solutions through internet searches and following online forum conversation threads. PresentationPoint offers a fantastic suite of applications so that users can move through their products as the solution they require becomes more complicated. We thought the offer of an affordable entry level solution, with the potential to move on to more complex solutions in due course, was a fantastic offer.
We found cloud hosting solutions – all of which become very expensive in the medium and long term; we found server-based solutions at four figure prices; we also found free open source applications but none of these proved to be as robust or bug-free as promoted.
It was clear that PresentationPoint stood out from the competition – of particular importance was the speed of their customer support answering my questions before we ever spent a single pound with them.
MessagePoint installed without a hitch on all 5 of the PCs we are running (we are using Chill Blast’s Micro System which is perfect for display applications); the software works perfectly on each machine and activating the licenses was easy. Due to the trial option, we could get MessagePoint working instantly and then activated the licenses a few days in (although it turned out to be instant).
It would be great if other schools will take the motivation from you to install digital signage at schools.