Managing a centralised communication strategy for multi academy trusts can be a major balancing act. You need to keep stakeholders, staff, and students informed while maintaining a cohesive identity across the multiple sites of your trust.
The ultimate readiness checklist
Digital signage is one of the most effective ways to drive engagement, celebrate student success, and share real time safeguarding updates. However, simply buying a few screens and putting them in reception areas isn’t a strategy, it’s an expensive tech experiment. Before setting up, you need a plan in place to ensure your infrastructure, team, and content workflow are aligned. Use our MAT digital signage readiness checklist to see if your trust is ready to switch on your signage.
Network and infrastructure
Digital signage requires a secure, stable, and scalable network. Without proper infrastructure, you can risk performance issues and security vulnerabilities.
Bandwidth and connectivity
Do your schools have the network capacity and reliable connection to support continuous media playback quietly in the background?
Ensure schools have the bandwidth to support continuous media playback without disrupting classroom teaching or slowing internet speeds.
Power and placement
Have you tried out potential screen locations for adjacent mains power and Ethernet ports?
Relying purely on school Wi-Fi can lead to dead zones and dropped feeds, especially in high traffic corridors or sports halls.
Hardware standardisation
Are you investing in commercial-grade displays designed to run safely all day in busy public spaces, or are you going to repurpose your TV screens?
Where possible, we suggest you use a hardware player device you can manage and control remotely using an MDM or similar remote management tool. These tools often let you set on and off times and update the software remotely.
Team training and content strategy
Signage makes the most impact if the content is current. Empty or outdated screens can look unprofessional, having a consistent content strategy is essential.
Content champions
Have you designated at least one staff member per school to be responsible for keeping the content fresh?
Relying on a single central IT or communications lead to manage every screen across a Multi Academy Trust can often create workload challenges and operational bottlenecks. Designate content leads at each school to keep displays relevant. Empowering local staff to share site-specific updates reduces the burden on central IT while maintaining oversight.
Graphic assets and branding
Do you have pre-made, responsive templates that scale across different screen sizes without distorting text and imagery?
Use our Smart Content to create consistency with branded content. This allows local staff to input text and photos easily without breaking formatting rules or compromising the trust’s visual identity.TrilbyTV allows you to customise the interface to match your school or organisation’s branding. You can upload your organisation’s logo and set default brand colours via the Settings dashboard.
Compliance and safeguarding
Beyond strategy and infrastructure, prioritising data privacy, cybersecurity, and physical safety is crucial when implementing digital signage.
GDPR and student privacy
Does your content workflow include a strict check when uploading photos or videos of students featured on public facing screens?
Ensure student media on public screens have appropriate parental marketing consent. To maintain compliance, use first names only or omit names entirely where necessary.
Cyber security
To comply with your IT security policies – are encrypted connections, secure player hardware, and user authentication software properly verified and up to date?
Verify that connections are encrypted and hardware is secure. Using dedicated media players and cloud-based permission management enhances network security and power efficiency.
Physical safety
Are the physical brackets, mounts, and protective casings compliant with school health and safety standards, especially in high-traffic corridors, assembly halls, or sports areas?
Displays in communal areas must be shatter-resistant and securely positioned to prevent hazards and ensure all mounts and casings meet school health and safety standards.
The verdict – Are you ready?
If you agree to most of these questions and statements, your MAT is in a fantastic position to deploy TrilbyTV, which can enable you to elevate communication across your schools. If you found a few gaps, don’t worry! Spotting them now saves your trust time, budget, and logistical headaches later.
Where is your trust currently in its digital signage journey? If you are evaluating software options, or trying to manage an existing multi-school rollout? We’re here to help, try out TrilbyTV for free with a 30 day trial. Or book a demo with us so we can walk you through the platform and show you how you can make the most of your digital signage.