City of Glasgow College’s pioneering project has been procured under the Scottish Government’s NPD framework.
The £228m construction contract for the new campuses, located at high profile locations in the centre of Glasgow, will cater for 40,000 students and 1,200 staff.

FES Communications provided the ISLT design and installation, an array of corporate and student IT requirements will be embedded into the buildings’ fabric, and integrated into one network for voice, video and data to all work together alongside the building management systems.

FES focused on developing an ISLT solution that aligns closely with the needs of the College and optimises opportunities for future infrastructure and service development. Our challenge, in which we have been successful, was to build an integrated system and supporting supplier ecosystems to achieve these goals without compromising value for money to the City of Glasgow College.

In designing the ICT provision, FES took full account of the Colleges aspiration in respect of ‘new pedagogies’. It is clear from the context that the College sees many, if not most, of these pedagogies being supported by the technology-rich environment to be found in its classrooms, workspaces and other formal and informal learning spaces.

Many of these aspects of learning are well proven concepts that have been given new affordances in education through the application of new technologies. These include means of better engaging students – such as active and cooperative learning, learning communities, co-creation of learning, inquiry and problem-based learning, and team projects – that have all been re-invigorated through ICT.

FES provided a full passive network infrastructure ready for next-generation teaching and learning.

The passive cabling solution proposed is based on the Brand Rex 10GPlus end to end unshielded solution for over 20,000 horizontal cabling outlets and air blown fibre range for backbone connectivity.

An end-to-end cisco active network with 14,000 active ports and wireless solution which is then overlaid with cisco IP Telephony, IP Television and a Digital Display infrastructure.

FES also provided a virtualised server solution with SAN and Backup systems for the College’s two campuses. The solution provides virtualised servers and storage facilities for the College’s applications and associated data. It is resilient by design to cater for business continuity needs whilst also meeting the backup requirements of the College.

FES provided a Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI) solution along with 3,500 thin client devices that will enhance teaching and learning by providing secure access to teaching and learning materials from traditional devices, thin client devices or other devices running thin client access software.