Government’s meddling in technology in education is overdue. Remember the “every classroom gets an interactive whiteboard” push, well, I think we’re due another and due to the Governments latest appointment it makes the most sense that you will be seeing a push for “every classroom gets wireless Internet connectivity.”
So what would a wirelessly connected room bring?
It would certainly tick one of Naace’s boxes of empowering pupils devices as they would be able to get online and access learning resources and have their device “updated” by the school either via purchased apps or via free apps online.
Who wins from a wirelessly connected school?
There are really 4 or so big hardware players in this market, namely Netgear, Cisco, Meru and Ruckus. Most other companies can’t compete as the residential grade wireless isn’t up to the job in high densities. Who wins from a services point of view? There are hundereds of wireless installation companies, the key ones that have the skills to do school specific deployments are Ergo, RM and Primary Technology.
Why would the government make a push for this?
It’s true that Gove doesn’t seem very interested in technology in education however with the new appointment of Phil Smith and his background at Cisco I can imagine he will want to put a stamp on things and what better/easier/more natural way than trying to improve the nations infrastructure by empowering pupils mobile learning devices and at the same time empowering “legacy” school owned equipment such as netbooks and laptops.