Budget of £70k to spend but on what?

[rpain]

School with pupils aged 3-13 with 2 main servers, about 70 desktops/laptops of differing specs and most with xp pro, gigabit networking throughout and ad hoc wireless routers. Most smart boards in good condition. What would you spend the money on if it was available (I doubt a pay rise is an option) - Virtual desktops? I read another post of someone with £3k to spend and the suggestions were really good but with a big chunk of money I've been getting quite excited about the option of everyone having virtual desktops with faster load up times (depending on the server hardware).

Richard

[glennda]

You could do VDI and keep the existing desktops, all depends on what applications you are trying to then run.

If you have ad-hoc wireless i suggest full campus wide solution.

[zag]

I'd buy low power workstations all around. A Managed wireless system and virtualise the servers.

Maybe a few ipads for teachers as well.

Could create a new network with that kind of money.

[crc-ict]

Sounds like priorities might be wrong if there is £70k allocated to spend with no particular purpose for it.

Of course, there is plenty of value you could do with the money, but it's a lot to spend on anything without an identified need for it.

[mavhc]

Managed wireless, windows 7

[rpain]

I agree to a certain extent. I'm just interested in where people think the future of computing in education going - I doubt we'll see this kind of budget again for a long time so really I just want to future proof our setup as best possible while the funds are available.

[Millgate]

New switches, wireless, possibly server & or desktop refresh. It's the right time of year to be doing it (if you are planning it before xmas). A lot of vendors will give some awesome discounts in December!

[glennda]

I agree to a certain extent. I'm just interested in where people think the future of computing in education going - I doubt we'll see this kind of budget again for a long time so really I just want to future proof our setup as best possible while the funds are available.

invest in the infrastructure fully managed switches, full managed wireless (I'm a Meraki fan) once that is in place then the future is adaptable to any kind of device unless somebody changes the way wireless works/ehtrrndt works!

[GrumbleDook]

Invest in a conslutant to help you spend the money! My rates are reasonable (well ... to me they are!)

[Dos_Box]

NetSupport has a very good offer on NetSupport DNA at the moment: NetSupport DNA Schools Special Offer

[AgnosticAdvice]

It all depends on what you have and where you want to be

[tech_guy]

iPADS!

[X-13]

iPADS!

For skeet shooting?

[synaesthesia]

Wrong place to be asking, I think. You'd need a meeting with the relevant people at the school (heads, governing body) to find out where they would like to go. Of course it's good to have some suggestions, hence this thread, but ultimately any goals should be coming from them. It doesn't have to be technical at all - it just has to be "what we see our pupils doing with IT, how it could help them in their education, how it could help them maybe at home (cloud based resources perhaps)"

You've got this £70k now. But will you have anything to show for it in say, 3 to 5 years? You could turn that entire network around and help futureproof it for around 20. That still leaves 50 big ones to allocate. Choose wisely, otherwise in Indiana Jones' metaphorical world, this could be you (my apologies if you don't understand/recognise the reference):

[squeeky]

If your running xp and you have a large sum I suggest starting to think about new hardware and software in terms of laptops, tablets and desktops also looking at your projectors etc