Avonbourne Academies & Avonwood Primary School in Bournemouth are part of United Learning, a trust that seeks to improve the life chances of young people, bringing out ‘the best in everyone’, whether that be pupils, staff or parents.
The schools have been working to use technology to enhance the learning experience of pupils. One key aspect of this has been digital signage, helping to build cohesion amongst staff and pupils, while communicating to the wider community. They chose TrilbyTV as their digital signage solution as it is simple to use, made specifically for education and allows multiple members of staff throughout the school to take ownership. Not only does it serve as a way to build community amongst stakeholders but it can be used as a very powerful marketing tool, giving insight to those beyond the school walls.
Five considerations for digital signage
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When we arrived, the Reception area screen was playing a video showcasing what goes on within the school walls to the wider school community. We were met by IT Services Operations Manager, Peter Annandale. After sitting down for a coffee, Peter told us,
“When taking the role, it was literally one of my first projects. Originally we had one screen in reception which had a Powerpoint running and constantly had to be managed by IT. After finding TrilbyTV, we discovered that the software was very user friendly and easy to set up. At first the staff were a little apprehensive but after a few short sessions, they ran with it and now they can really see the advantages!”
Peter noticed the benefits straight away, learning that he didn’t need to micromanage the signage,
“It’s quite intuitive, once the staff had been taught how to use the software, you can leave it to them to manage. So for the IT Team it’s had minimal impact on us time-wise. Usually you’ll find that as you add more systems, it will take a lot of time out of your day – with TrilbyTV you can just set it and forget it.”
Tag where you want your content to show
Categories are something that Peter has really found useful, functionality-wise. This is where you can “tag” content while uploading to go onto certain screens. Something that can be easier than uploading different content to different playlists,
“Having categories makes it really simple. Once we were set up, I named the categories after the different locations of the screens. This means that staff members can literally go on, upload their content and tag which screens they want it to play.”
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Book free DemoOne of the key areas that attracts a lot of attention is Avonwood’s Canteen screen,
“We’ve got another one in the hall for the children,” Peter told us. “When the kids are having their lunch, the content on there shows what’s going on around the school – This can be events like World Book Day. It’s great to see how engaged they get with the content on the screen. The content catalogue with pre-made content has been fantastic, especially WWF Facts.”
Deputy Headteacher, Joe Jackson-Taylor has found TrilbyTV perfect for promoting the school externally, keeping classes fully subscribed,
Utilising digital signage as a PR tool
“It’s a fantastic PR tool, we use a lot of teaching and learning videos, along with footage of the kids in lessons and out in the playground. This has helped show the wider community what goes on inside Avonbourne. Bournemouth as a whole has had a low local birth rate, which has meant that many schools are struggling to get their spaces filled. Fortunately, we have still managed to remain fully subscribed and digital signage has definitely helped with this.”
Thoughts from the Headteacher
Finally, Headteacher, Chris Jackson summed up Avonbourne’s experience with TrilbyTV,
“We’ve worked with the Department of Education to lead the way with a virtual school provision. So we try to be at the cutting edge with different bits of tech and TrilbyTV has been a big part of this. So far it’s been fantastic and has gone down really well with staff and it’s an exciting project for us to take forward.
Peter added, “ It’s changed the way we communicate and the way that information is shared, helping us to target different groups at the same time.”
If you’d like to learn more about how TrilbyTV can help your school switch on its signage, then book a free demo session here.