After visiting Harris Academy Orpington last year, we wanted to continue our educational case studies with Harris Federation, which has over 50 schools and over five and a half thousand members of staff across the country. We recently visited Harris Academy Greenwich and met with Head of school, Jack Docherty and IT Technician, Jason Cook.
Jack started off by telling us how TrilbyTV was first introduced to their school,
“We’ve had screens up since the building was built in 2014, but every single screen in the school had exactly the same things on. We wanted to have different bits of information in different parts of the building so that we could make the running of the school even more efficient and that’s really important for us. We timed this with a real central push on shouting about and showcasing great student work, which we weren’t quite good enough at before. It used to be a little bit transactional but now we can be really purposeful with it.”
Keeping a student focus
With digital signage, showcasing your students is what it’s all about, sharing their work and achievements. Jason told us from their perspective the reason for wanting to use digital signage at the school,
“We wanted a way of getting the students involved, especially as there’s lots going on around the school. With the content on the website we found that the students weren’t really looking at it, so we wanted something that was in their faces, also something that they could get involved with. We wanted to make it more student-based.”
“The interaction with the students now is great, they’re coming up to me saying what they like on the screens. I like being able to customise the content as I need to, for the school clubs I’m able to add GIFs to the club specific content, like our chess clubs for example. As for features, I really like the Birthdays content. It’s all about getting everyone into it and involved, which is nice.”
Harris Academy Greenwich had a digital signage solution in place before, but they told us that the screens weren’t in the right places and were generally smaller overall, essentially not having the impact that they should. The usability wasn’t great and the formats were very limited. But now with TrilbyTV, they can use and display the content however they want. Jack explained how having TrilbyTV now has helped them with sharing key messages in the right place at the right time,
“As part of our reimagination of how we could do it even better, we got bigger screens and we moved them so we’ve now got different places in the school to showcase around. We really wanted to hit visitors with the positive things that are going on in the schools, they can walk into the canteen and they want to be shown something else in comparison to another location, such as what a healthy meal is and what they could be getting at lunch today. I’m also looking forward to using it during the exam season to bring real clarity when there’s lots of things going on. I think its adaptability could be really useful there.”
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Book free DemoThe need for digital signage
By using digital signage to share and showcase, you can make your students and staff feel good about themselves and their work. Jack then went on to tell us why they needed digital signage,
“Using the screens allows us to adapt all the time to showcase some great stuff. Whenever we feel like a particular year group needs a shout out, we can respond to that within minutes, rather than using big notice boards which are a little bit slow to create. It’s a great way of changing the culture, the fact that the students are talking about the rewards that they get and they’re talking about how to take responsibility, how to be kind, how to work hard, which are our key values in our school. It’s about changing the daily habitual conversation that’s happening with the students and it’s something that we will look into expanding even further.”
“When thinking of digital signage, the three words that immediately come to mind are celebrate, promote and enthuse. It should celebrate difference, success and should celebrate efforts. Digital signage should promote amazing things that are happening in the school and it should enthuse students to be even better.”
Showcasing on inset days and events
Jack explained how TrilbyTV has helped their school staff when they have work that they want to shout about, showcasing the students to the rest of the school and sharing what’s going on,
“Any time that we need to welcome staff or have key messages around the buildings, such as inset days it’s been really useful for us to use the screens to brand the school. It’s a way of reaffirming and highlighting key messages, it’s a great outlet for that. For the parents that will naturally wait in reception, they get a flavour of what it is to come inside of the school. It’s great for all types of visitors as well, with our open mornings and events the visitors can get a real sense of what it’s like as they walk around school. The adaptability of it is a highlight, the fact that we can change the screens at a moment’s notice. It’s nice to simplify things and by being able to personalise the branding and the messages that we want to give out there.”
Jason then explained how TrilbyTV affected the IT department’s involvement in digital signage,
“I’ve always been involved and I’ve noticed it feels more productive now, I’m slowly getting more departments on board. We always get art involved because they’ve great photos and pieces of work to show, but now we’re getting other departments like PE involved and also the science club. When they had their stem projects we showed them on the screens, by getting the other departments involved it feels more like a team, bringing everyone together.”
After finding that more and more students want to get involved, as they like seeing the screens and are receiving positive comments back, Jason told us they’re trying to grow their digital signage. Before, it was just in the canteen, now there’s a screen in reception and in other various places around the school, and it’s still growing. They do have plans for more, in locations like the library, and have spoken about screens for the staff room.
Jack told us how displaying content via TrilbyTV has made them think about the open narrative around positive behaviour from the students. How sharing achievements has made students strive for visual confirmation but also makes them feel better about themselves that their name is being shown and celebrated. Jack said,
“It’s great seeing the positive point leaderboards and seeing different names up there every few days. We reset it every week so it doesn’t matter how good you are one week you can always get up there for the following week. It’s the fist pump moments of students that you would never have traditionally thought would have happened. If someone is having a brilliant week, it’s great as everyone is giving them either a physical or metaphorical high five as they walk down the corridor and just feel really good about themselves. Being able to share digital signage content every day that is really well thought out and hugely positive can only help in that endeavour.”
Guide to effective digital signage in education
Request free guideFinally, Jason summarised their TrilbyTV experience so far,
“From my point of view, I like TrilbyTV because of its usability. I find it’s so easy to use and it’s quick. I don’t have to spend all of my day coding, moving stuff, converting to different file types, it’s just easy. I can make up a slide or a video and just paste it in. I think digital signage should be inclusive, it should enable the spreading of information throughout the school, letting students know that they’re doing well and something that everyone should be involved with and TrilbyTV is all of those things. Having ownership of the content pushed out across the school is great, I love being creative with it and I want to expand it across more screens that we plan to install over the next year.”
It was great to catch up with Jack and Jason and hear all of the positive things they had to say, it’s exciting to see how they will grow the digital signage across Harris Academy Greenwich. If you are not already using TrilbyTV, find out more about what we have to offer your school by signing up for a demo session today. You can also sign up for a 30 day free trial where you can try out TrilbyTV for yourself.