User Story from North Tyneside Council
Longbenton and Marden City Learning Centres are part of a network of 105 CLCs around the UK. They create exciting, non-school like environments that provide state-of-the-art Information and Communications Technology (ICT) based learning opportunities to surrounding schools and to the local community.
Planet eStream was installed in 2004 as part of a video conferencing and communication project, jointly funded by North Tyneside Council, Longbenton CLC and Marden CLC. The Planet eStream server is housed at the central Council Data Centre, providing access via the North Tyneside Council Metropolitan Network - a network connecting schools, libraries and corporate bodies under a single infrastructure. The Planet eStream media encoders are installed at satellite sites including the two partner sites at Longbenton and Marden.
North Tyneside council and its partners have opted to harness the power of Planet eStream as a back office environment whereby content on Planet eStream is created and maintained strictly by Staff and teachers in the LEA. This content is then accessed by Staff, pupils and parents via the North Tyneside Learning Portal (www.ntlp.org.uk).
Jonathan and Ian provided some examples of tangible benefits that Planet eStream has brought to their venture:
"Prior to the installation of Planet eStream, videos produced by pupils at the CLC were made available by creating DVDs and distributing copies at a later date. Video content is now immediately encoded using Planet eStream and published through the learning portal, enabling children and parents to view the work from home."
Longbenton Community College, one of the satellite sites have encoded most of their media catalogue onto the eStream system which has enabled them to access material without having to continually move video recorders and tapes around the college.
Teachers have found the ability to create lesson plans with eStream using the mixed media content a very useful feature.
Teaching staff travelling between sites can access media throughout the LEA.
"The Learning Portal keeps statistics of access to material it publishes. These show that media streams are requested much more than static images, indicating the value of the Planet eStream resource in engaging user interest."
Jonathan and Ian's future plans to develop the use of eStream within the LEA include its integration with Video Conferencing and the live streaming of events.
Jonathan Chicken
Longbenton CLC Manager
Ian Mather
Infrastructure Management Consultant
North Tyneside Council