Service agreement gives private school IT operation for all the money
St Paul’s private school is equipped for today’s demands on web access but also on security. An IT service agreement with Tecsys ensures that infrastructure and operations are on top and in safe hands, also financially.
“At a small school, we can’t hire someone to look after our IT, but we need someone who can take on the task of running our IT infrastructure, ensuring uptime, updating IT security, etc.,” says Zenia Finderup Valsted, Finance and IT Manager at St Paul’s School.
St Paul’s School in Taastrup is a Catholic private school. With about 250 students from kindergarten through grade 9 and 25 teachers, it is probably typical of many of the country’s smaller private schools.
Zenia Finderup Valsted continues, “I don’t have time to set up a server myself or help my colleagues with IT problems. Tecsys takes care of that. They take all the hassle away. At the same time, I am comfortable with our agreement. With the grant from the Ministry of Education, we are subject to their accounting rules and must not spend unnecessary money. We get a lot for our money and we only pay for the service we use. We do not feel that Tecsys is doing anything unnecessary, on the contrary I perceive them as very price conscious.
It’s like when you take your car to the mechanic. You need to trust them to do what they need to do and no more. The agreement also gives us flexibility. The service is fast when there is a problem and although we have a permanent contact person, there are several in Tecsys who know our installation and can step in. We are never alone.”
Zenia Finderup Valsted
Finance and IT Manager
Saint Paul’s School
The solution consists of:
IT infrastructure significantly improved
Saint Paul's School changes hardware every four years. Most recently, they bought 50 laptops, one for each teacher, and a new class set of 25 laptops. The class set is used in the younger grades. From grade 4, students must purchase their own PC. Tecsys helped procure and set them up with Microsoft 365 free version for students. They are placed in a trolley where they can be loaded and easily rolled out in the classrooms.
All students have a user profile set up in the cloud, where they can access learning materials and their own documents both from school and home. This has been particularly beneficial while students have been home and teaching has been running on Teams.
The IT infrastructure has been significantly improved since its launch in 2016. Back up and security procedures are in place. The number of access points and the speed have been increased so that traffic from all types of devices - PCs, mobiles and tablets - can run in top gear at all times. Firewalls and restrictions on which services students can access are also extended.
Zenia Finderup Valsted explains, "We restrict access to certain portals as part of the school's IT policy, and it works well. For exams and term tests, where students should not have access to the network, Tecsys makes sure to shut down the relevant access points and keep others running so that teaching at the rest of the school is not affected. They just open and close."
We know each other well
Since 2016, the school has been working with Tecsys to operate and maintain the school's IT.
"The initial task was to create a stable and coherent IT environment," says Lasse Lindholm, Head of Department, Tecsys Hosting and IT Services.
He adds, "Secondly, we have installed a lot of hardware for the infrastructure, especially focusing on continuously updating IT security, availability and reliability. Our ongoing service is about monitoring operations and being available when needed either on-site at the school or remotely from the Tecsys operations centre. It can be simple things like a set-up error or bigger problems that need repair or replacement. We have a good working relationship and we know each other and the IT installation very well," concludes Lasse Lindholm.
The school's IT budget will cover licences, new purchases and operations, for which the school board has set a four-year service plan. Major investments, such as the decision to upgrade with new and more powerful firewalls, are allocated separately.
Contact Lasse Lindholm at lasse.lindholm@tecsys.com or on tel: 88 33 57 21, to have a chat about how Tecsys Hosting can help your school with IT.