Schools save millions by switching from BT to Easynet

450 schools benefiting from faster, cheaper broadband

Schools save £20m over three years

Some 450 schools in the North East have saved £20m over three years on their broadband, with a good percentage of these savings coming from a switch in supplier from BT to Easynet.

The change was managed by the Northern Grid for Learning, a member of the Northeast Consortium for Learning, which also oversaw an upgrade to the core network and has been working with Easynet since 2001.

Mel Philipson, manager of Northern Grid for Learning, explained that the switch came after BT significantly increased the price of its 10Mbit/s internet connections 18 months ago.

“These are the types of connection used by primary schools and the increased price became a burden,” she said.

“Where the telephone exchanges had been upgraded we swapped out the 10Mbit/s BT circuits for circuits [of 10Mbit/s or 20Mbit/s] provided by Easynet, which were cheaper. We are still waiting on a number of upgrades though,” she added.

Schools have also saved money by sharing broadband services, because alongside a significant upgrade to the core network, each local authority joined with at least one other.

The upgrade of the core network itself saw the installation of two sub regional points of presence, with each point of presence upgraded from 100Mbit/s to enable 1Gbit/s transit. The firewalls were also replaced and upgraded. The network now delivers guaranteed uptime of 99 per cent.

Mel Philipson, manager of Northern Grid for Learning, said: “Prior to this upgrade schools were regularly using 75 per cent of their broadband capacity, and some were experiencing latency and other problems as a result. The enhanced capacity has overcome this problem.”

Philipson said that the body is looking into what developing a Public Sector Network would mean, but that it was still at the theoretical stage.

“On the one hand people need to buy into the idea of sharing services in this way, and that’s a significant hurdle in itself. But the technical challenges are more daunting. Joining networks as well as ensuring capacity and security [necessary for schools and hospitals sending private data] is a big task,” Philipson said.