When Santa Sabina College in Sydney’s inner west was planning a new building with stateof- the-art technology, the challenge was to ensure the school’s network infrastructure could withstand the additional load.

With more than 1500 students from Kindergarten to Year 12, the College is much like a large business in terms of its network, in that it has a large number of users and requires a secure, stable and efficient IT network.

Six computer rooms and 80 computers in the primary and secondary school libraries form the backbone of the College’s IT resources.

There are also at least three networked computers in each primary school classroom and groups of 10 networked machines in specific classrooms to support Key Learning Areas within the secondary school.

In addition, all teaching staff have a notebook computer. To bridge these resources, the College operates on hybrid of cable and wireless networking across two campuses.

Santa Sabina’s Director of Information Technology, Joseph Agius, said the network was essential to the running of the College.

He said the College began planning for the integration of the new building, the Aquinas Centre, into the network by analysing existing requirements and assessing the impact the centre would have. The results spurred the College into action.

“Our network infrastructure is as important as our electrical and traditional communications systems” , Mr Agius said.

“Adding another physical network in the new building would have created an unacceptable scenario.”

While optimising network performance was a major concern, the College also wanted to improve security and prepare for the deployment of a large scale wireless network.

The College approached trusted IT partner Computelec to develop a Virtual Local Area Network (VLAN) solution building on existing HP ProCurve network infrastructure. This would allow the College to break up its flat network into a number of smaller units, or VLANs.

To deploy the solution, Computelec configured the HP ProCurve 5300xl and 2848 series core and edge switches already operating in Santa Sabina College’s network. This involved tailoring the settings of the switches, which connect network segments, to the College’s specific needs.

The result was greater control over internal traffic, reducing the strain on the network and improving its performance and speed. The configuration has also helped Santa Sabina lay the groundwork for further IT security plans.

Sean McMahon, a Senior Systems Engineer with Computelec, assisted the College in developing the VLAN solution and conducted the configuration on-site over two days.

“While it’s an educational institution, Santa Sabina College is similar to many large businesses in that it has such a large number of users. It’s important to ensure that broadcasts, particularly internal traffic, are controlled to ensure the network is working at an optimal level” , Mr McMahon said.

“The new configuration also allows port-based authentication, which Santa Sabina plans to implement in the future. This feature is particularly useful for schools and educational institutions because it allows granular access - the IT administrator can create profiles so users can only access IT resources at certain places and times.”

While the College has not yet conducted a formal evaluation of the deployment, Mr Agius said anecdotal evidence was positive, showing the network was performing well.

“Users are happy with the result and IT staff have reported great improvements in processes like network back-ups” , he said.

With more than 17 years’ experience servicing the education market, Computelec is well-skilled in matching hardware, software and training solutions with customers’ needs.

Mr McMahon said “the pricing and reliability of HP’s products made them particularly suitable for schools and educational institutions.”

The lifetime warranty and technical support offered on the HP ProCurve switches was also appreciated by the IT staff at the College.

For Santa Sabina College, Computelec’s assistance in identifying and installing the HP products has been invaluable.

“Computelec keep abreast with the latest technologies. They synthesise the information and provide us solutions within the context of an educational framework and our particular requirements” , Mr Agius said.

“Computelec are a great partner. We have an excellent business relationship and their staff are often considered an extension of our IT department.”