Perins School

Perins School is a high-performing academy for children aged 11 to 16 years, based in the Hampshire market town of Alresford. The school is committed to providing a rounded and rich educational experience for all of their students, with an ethos that focuses on making sure every student has the opportunity to progress and develop at their own pace.

Perins is renowned across the UK as a pioneer of education technology. It’s been a 1:1 school since 2006, and has been influential in the evolution of mobile device programmes in the UK.

For the school, this experience has paid off. Its ability to continually evolve the programme each year to best meet the needs of their pupils has taken parental take-up to 99%.

As Caroline Cleaver, IT Administrator explains, the contribution model is central to the way that Perins thinks about programme success:

“We were one of the first schools to run it as a donation model. Many other schools run this type of programme in a more in a traditional payment model, but we are steadfast on making sure that our programme is fully inclusive for all of our pupils.

“We set up the 1:1 programme for all Year 7 pupils, giving all new starters at the school a new device. Parents or guardians then contribute on a monthly basis to support its operation. When pupils get to Year 10, we offer an optional 2 year top up scheme to give them access to a newer device if they want one.

“Most people know us as a 1:1 school. When we brief parents and guardians of new pupils starting our school in the Autumn Term intake, it’s an integral part of that parents evening.”

One evolution from a teaching and learning perspective is how the school thinks about the application of the technology within the classroom.

Caroline comments: “In the earlier days of our programme, we used to have an e-learning champion to work with teachers on how best to use the technology in the classroom to augment the learning. Now, e-learning is a core part of all teachers roles because our programme has developed to a point where the technology is embedded in the culture of our school and the way the curriculum is delivered.

To get such a high take up from parents requires comprehensive planning where every little detail has been thought through, tested and validated.

All devices deployed through the Perins 1:1 programme have a typical support package comprising of 3 years warranty and maintenance- meaning that whatever the reason is for a device to be out of commission, it can be fixed quickly.

Perins has taken the desire for a speedy response to new levels by utilising self-maintainer status, which means all repairs are conducted onsite by their own IT team.

Caroline expands: “Teachers don’t necessarily use the devices each lesson, but they depend on the fact that if they do want to use the technology that it’s available and ready-to-use.

“We maintain a spare parts pool within the school. This enables us to jump on any repairs straight away and issue a loan device until our team have fixed the faulty one. As a process it works seamlessly and removes any negative impact on our pupils’ learning.”

Perins’ IT team take their programme responsibilities very seriously, and make it their business to keep a working device in the hands of every student. Running such a tight ship allows them to concentrate on educating pupils about their responsibilities.

“We position it to pupils that this is a learning tool which needs respecting and looking after. We set out the school’s expectation that devices need to be brought into school every day, fully charged. When it breaks, they need to bring it in for a repair straight away.” Caroline says.

Over the years of running 1:1 programmes, one area of change has been regarding Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) provision.

Historically the school did support BYOD for all the right reasons, but found that it impacted the teaching and learning experience in a negative way.

Caroline explains: “We used to let older pupils bring in their own device from school and support it that way. However we found that it was more difficult to get pupils to remember to bring in those devices in fully charged.

“If there was an issue with a device, then getting it repaired or fixed may take some time. This is counter to the way we think about our programme and its impact both in the classroom and at home. This was how we ended up adding the refresh stage for Year 10 pupils within the school.”

To get to a point of near 100% take-up and a process which runs like clockwork has meant Perins has had to continually reevaluate the partners they work with to deliver programme success.

Caroline adds: “Over the years, we’ve had to change device manufacturers, suppliers and 1:1 programme providers to set ourselves up for success. We’ve tried the vast majority of companies in the market over the time and we are very comfortable we now have the right partners in place.

“At Perins, we have a very close relationship with Freedom Tech. They do a fantastic job of managing the donation collection process on behalf of our school.

“Because it’s a contribution model, we have to ensure that the programme operates in compliance with guidelines set out by HMRC and that we run a scheme which is ethical and in-keeping with our wider philosophy around inclusion. We run a blended model with Freedom Tech to remind parents about missed contributions.

“In terms of devices, we have standardised on the Stonebook Mini. Stone have been extremely supportive of our self-maintainer status – giving us access to the spare parts we need at the reasonable prices we need to make our programme cost effective for parents and guardians.

“Previously, we were with one of the multinational OEMs, and they continually raised the prices of spare parts to the point where we could not work with them any longer. It was simply unsustainable.

“Stone have a very close relationship with Freedom Tech, which means we have a one stop shop for payment collection services and administration, maintenance cover, quality devices and the warranty package.”

When asked to summarise the value Freedom Tech provide to Perins, Caroline is clear in her response:

“Freedom Tech have a great deal of experience working with a range of different schools and configurations of 1:1 programmes. They’ve been happy to learn from us, and we learn from them.

“They never dictate: they share what works with other schools that they work with and this helps us to continue to be the best we can be for our pupils and parents. This kind of flexibility makes them invaluable to what we do here.

“They have an excellent portal that makes the ordering process for parents really easy. It’s fully integrated into Stone’s OEM build process – which makes the whole order-to-rollout process connected.

“They also consolidate the information into the school on a monthly basis that clearly details the direct debits, service costs, leasing information for us to process.

“Freedom Tech genuinely collaborate with Perins. At our parents evening, helpful staff from Stone and Freedom Tech attended to ensure that parents and guardians were fully informed about the programme and how to use the portal.

“They are fully involved in all aspects of the programme. Not every school will have someone like me who is an internal point of contact for the programme. Freedom Tech can help all schools put in place a programme that runs in an efficient and compliant way – regardless of what internal resources they have.”