Rothwell Junior School and Rothwell Victoria Infant School

Rothwell Junior School and Rothwell Victoria Infant School are two large federated schools based in Rothwell, Northamptonshire. With 676 pupils ranging from 4-11 in age attending the school, the school’s vision is to achieve the highest academic standards for all.

Head of Year Three and Class Teacher, Gareth Rust was tasked with upgrading 33 classrooms which had legacy and out dated whiteboards to flat panel displays. Avocor talks to Gareth about the project and his decision to choose Avocor.

The reason for change

In 2016, the School made the decision that the existing whiteboard were no longer fit for purpose, with many of the whiteboards no longer able to respond to touch interactively. Ceiling mounted projectors were displaying low clarity images whilst even relatively low levels of ambient light coming into classrooms were causing the content on the whiteboards to be virtually unreadable. This combined with the spiralling costs of replacement projector bulbs meant that it was becoming more cost effective for the school to replace as opposed to repair.

“We were aware that technology had progressed considerably since when we had purchased our first generation interactive whiteboards.” says Gareth “this combined with the changes in the curriculum and the move towards more collaborative teaching and learning environments led us to evaluate our front of class display technology to ensure we were offering our children the best classroom experiences possible, we were looking for a display that would offer consistent and crystal-clear clarity for the children without compromising on the size of the display that the teaching staff were used to using, Avocor fitted the bill perfectly”

Finding the right solution

After making the decision that a refresh of the existing interactive display estate, Gareth and the Head teacher attended the Bett show in London to research what was available and the choice was vast, so worked with Avocor to find a suitable solution.

“We spoke to a number of different interactive display manufacturers to establish which would best meet our needs” explains Gareth “We wanted to see how the different display technologies compared against each other and, importantly, how the different manufacturers’ technology was impacted by ambient light. We also keen to ensure screen clarity regardless of where you were sitting in the classroom, so we arrange for a number of different solutions to be evaluated”

Gareth was immediately impressed with the Avocor interactive solution and how the display met all his criteria. “The interface was simple to understand and one that all of our teaching faculty would embrace.”

Gareth also felt that the Avocor display demonstrated excellent value for money whilst the warranty period offered delivered ultimate peace of mind. “We felt that the cost of replacing our legacy technology offset the cost implications of ongoing maintenance of the antiquated solutions.”
Rothwell Junior School replaced all their 33 existing systems to Avocor and immediately saw the benefit with pupils able to read the displays, gaining more time in lesson to learn and teachers able to start using the displays instantly, with no complicated adoption training required.