October, 2009

In parallel with Gerald’s written case studies (see Saturday’s post) in September, I also managed to get out of the office, and visit North Leamington School in Warwickshire – with a film crew in tow.

Although they’d only just opened, and they were adjusting to the new school site, they were very accommodating, and willing interview candidates!

The goal was to capture their story – of opening a brand new school in September, with a big deployment of Windows 7. You can see the result for yourself below.

It was an astonishing project to complete on time, as the Warwickshire IT team had only finally got access to be able to install the IT equipment on the 20th August, and so they had to deploy a brand new, massive network in just a couple of weeks. And make sure it was running for the new arrivals.

From watching the video, you’d have no sense of how much pressure that will have placed on the school, the staff and the IT technicians, and it definitely seemed a swan-like performance (very smooth on the surface, but I imagine lots of paddling underneath!).

Normally, I wouldn’t be aiming to get a video produced so soon after a school had opened, but we had to rush this one through so that it could be shown when Steve Ballmer came to London. It’ll be interesting to hear the student’s opinions in a few months – especially once they’ve all realised that they had Windows 7 so early, and their school really was a leap ahead.

Windows 7 became available to schools in mid-August 2009, uncomfortably close to the start of the new school year. Although there was every encouragement from Microsoft for schools taking the plunge, it’s difficult to avoid the conclusion that those ICT teams that grasped the nettle were displaying a fair amount of courage. The start of a school term, after all, isn’t a moveable deadline.

Whether the new operating system was installed or not, whether or not it worked, or did what was printed on the tin, the students, teachers and administrators were still going to arrive and switch on their machines expecting to do pick up where they left off before their holidays. Failure, as they say, was not an option.

These are the first two paragraphs from Gerald Haigh’s article about the experiences of the early schools using Windows 7 in the UK. After just two weeks of term time, he went out to talk to half a dozen schools for us, and record their stories. Gerald normally spends his time split between writing books for school leaders, and leadership focused articles for educational publications. But given his ability to dive straight in and ask the right questions, it made sense to ask him to talk to these early adopters.

The resulting document, which you can download from my SkyDrive, gives you a clear idea of the thoughts of those schools, and why they chose to make such an early start on Windows 7.

Take a look for yourself, and perhaps share with others in your school, to find out what happened when the following schools started term with Windows 7:

• West Hatch High School in Essex
• Lodge Park Technology College in Northamptonshire
• The Long Eaton School in Nottingham
• The Samworth Enterprise Academy in Leicester
• Twynham School in Dorset
• Broadclyst Primary School in Devon

Thanks to Gerald and the schools for their openness in doing this – what had originally seemed like it might make an interesting blog post has turned into a cracking 15 page read!

I’m sure this list is out on the web somewhere, but just in case you’ve not seen it in this easy-to-read format before, below is my list of the features of each version of Windows 7. I think this will help you to work out which one is right for your school:

• Windows 7 Home Premium is the retail version. It doesn’t allow network login (called Domain Join), so it’s unsuitable for school-based computers, and unlikely to be useful for student laptops owned by the school, unless you don’t plan to manage them or connect them up to your school network except via the web. It is also unable to run XP Mode, which might be useful for some of your older software.
  
• Windows 7 Professional is the minimum version you’ll need in-school as it has network domain join and XP Mode.
  
• Windows 7 Enterprise is the right version if you believe that you should be encrypting any laptops used by staff (this is something I believe strongly!), because it comes with BitLocker and BitLocker To Go. And in addition it also adds AppLocker – which you may want on all of your devices too.
  
• Windows 7 Ultimate is in the table below for completeness, but you are only likely to get this version if you buy it in a retail store with it pre-installed (which is an expensive way to get the functionality in Enterprise or Professional edition)

See below the table for my “How to Buy Windows 7” guide

What features are in which version of Windows 7?

How to buy Windows 7 for your school

So now you’ve worked out which version you want, you may want to know the best way to buy the right version!

Existing computers

• For any existing computers running any version of Windows XP or Windows Vista, you can buy a Windows 7 upgrade on your Select, SESP or School Agreement. If it’s basic Select, the upgrade is to Windows 7 Professional. If you have SESP or School Agreement, or buy a Select licence with the Software Assurance option, you’ll get Windows 7 Enterprise.

New computers

• For Professional edition, you can either buy a new PC with it pre-installed, or buy a PC with Windows 7 Home Premium, and then add an upgrade.
  It’s worth checking the price of both options, because the second often can often be cheaper.
• For Enterprise edition, the best way is to buy a new PC with Windows 7 Home Premium, and then add an upgrade licence via a School Agreement, or with the Select licence plus Software Assurance (which gives you the right to keep upgrading, and adds the Enterprise features)

Here’s some links to find out more about School Agreement, SESP, Select Licences and Software Assurance. And the evergreen “How to get the best deal on Microsoft software” post

Your existing Microsoft partner will be able to give you a quote. I’ve just checked on the Pugh site*, and they quote £34 for a Select Windows 7 Professional upgrade.

* Pugh is one of our partners, but there are plenty of others. You can find them all on our website