CUSTOMER SUCCESS STORY

In VUC Storstrøm invents the Virtual and Parallel Classroom with Polycom® RealPresence® Platform and Increase Student Enrolment

Industry Overview Enterprise – Consultant / Legal The General Adult Education Programme in Denmark forms part of the public Daily Use education system and is designed to help young and mature students improve or • Distance learning supplement their knowledge and skills within general subjects. VUC Stormstrøm is one of 30 adult education centres in Denmark providing students with the opportunity Daily Use to improve their educational skills and, ultimately, employment prospects. It is often Based on a platform of Polycom® referred to as the ‘second chance’ programme. VUC is situated in the region of RealPresence® Collaboration Manager, Polycom® RealPresence® Resource Manager and comprised of five campuses, 180 teachers and 5,000 students. Classes are held with over 1300 CMA® desktop licenses, and from 08:00 through to 22:00 to accommodate its students’ busy lives which often 13 RealPresence classrooms, VUC delivers include jobs and families. The programme delivers courses in all general education distant education and increase enrolment. subjects such as chemistry, foreign languages, mathematics, geography, social science Results and Benefits and political science. Students have the freedom of registering for one or several • Increase school enrolment courses, depending on their agendas and personal goals. • Increase level of education in rural areas Innovating with the First Parallel and Virtual Classroom • Improve quality of life for teachers • Reduction of carbon footprint The challenge VUC faced was to be able to extend their educational services and provide access to as many students as possible, giving students in rural areas equal opportunity to the programmes. It was also necessary to increase attendance in some classes where only a few students were registered, and the cost of running the class was difficult to justify. VUC sought to break down distances and barriers preventing students to get the education they wanted, and developed a programme called ‘Parallel Teaching’ in 2008. This programme allowed students to follow any course by going to the centre nearest to them.

To accomplish its objectives, VUC needed a trusted expert and partner in distant learning. It found the support and the answers to its questions within the Polycom team. Together, Polycom and VUC planned, designed and deployed Polycom® HDX® video collaboration solutions. Initially, the network connected classrooms in , Naestved, Fakse, Vordingborg, and Nykobin, and due to its great success has expanded to 13 classrooms delivering courses through video collaboration. In 2011 they were the first to expand the model to allow students to attend lessons virtually, using a home computer adding greater flexibility. VUC Storstrøm invited the local vocational college, CELF, to join the development concept called Global Classroom. VUC STORSTRØM

“With the Polycom® RealPresence® Platform, we are able to attract students who would otherwise be unable to attend qualifying courses, this is a true advantage for the second chance programme.” Flemming Neilsen, Parallel Classroom Project Manager, VUC Strostrøm

The Polycom RealPresence Platform Partner To bring the project to life, VUC decided on dual screen Polycom HDX room solutions. The multipoint connections are done using the Polycom RealPresence Collaboration Server (RMX®). Students participating in the programme have the option to attend from home or go to the nearest centres. For the ones who choose to work from home, VUC provides them with Polycom® CMA® software to download on their home computer. www.solutors.com/ This desktop video collaboration solution has an intuitive click-to- dial IM-Style interface. The students benefit from easy and high quality video interactions. Flemming Product Listing Neilsen, Project Manager responsible for the Parallel teaching project explains, Voice Conferencing “With the Polycom® RealPresence® Platform, we are able to attract students who • Polycom® Unified Collaboration would otherwise be unable to attend; this is a true advantage for the second chance System CX7000 programme.” Telepresence and Video Conferencing • Telepresence and Video Conferencing The teacher conducts his course normally in a classroom not like other. Students can • Polycom® HDX® 7000 RealPresence® dial into the course from any location. This has opened the catalogue of classes to Room Solutions many new students as it is so flexible and easy. A great benefit is the classes which • Polycom® HDX® 6000 RealPresence® traditionally had low registration are now filling up to normal 20 student capacity. Room Solutions • Polycom® CMA® Desktop A New Way of Teaching, a New Way of Learning Infrastructure For the teachers, it takes a little training, and a little getting used to. They must ensure • Polycom® RealPresence® Collaboration all participants have the proper books and materials to follow their course. Today, most Server (RMX®) class materials are available in electronic format, making this very simple. Teachers • Polycom® RealPresence® Resource using the technology are trained on how to communicate with distant locations. It takes Manager (CMA®) just one session for the teachers to see the benefits. “As educators, we need to find new ways to optimise our teaching methods, and deliver our courses to more students. This technology allows us to reach students in distant locations, and have a full virtual classroom.” explains Jens Illum, an english teacher.

For students, having access to the classes from their home or a centre near them has numerous advantages. This opens up the doors of the school to many who would not be able to attend. Lark Menko, a student who attends school from her home explains, “I have to pick up my daughter from school at 16:00, if I had to attend class at the VUC, I would not have time to get from my school to hers. Being at home makes it possible.” VUC STORSTRØM

“As educators we need to find new ways to optimise the teaching methods, and deliver our courses to more students. This technology allows us to reach more students and have a full virtual classroom.” Jens Illum, English Teacher, VUC Storstrøm

Results The Success Opens New Possibilities Kristian Madsen, Project Manager at VUC Storstrøm says, VUC quickly noticed the strength and power of students “Using the digital tools, we develop a new educational work completing their classes, raising the general level of education experience. For example, the Internet enables us to use in the region. The scale of this successful concept is now information, share knowledge, visualise and communicate shared with other VUCs, and thus generates further educational material in ways we have not been able to until now. At the same development for the expansion of the project. Current plans time, parallel teaching forces the students to work in a much are for VUC to expand the programme and grow the ‘Global more structured manner which benefits everyone.” Classroom’ concept. The idea is to work with other schools who are also using the technology to exchange best practices, share For VUC, the Polycom RealPresence Platform is the key knowledge, allowing each teacher to reach more students, and component which allowed them to reach their goal to innovate give the students the benefits of a greater education. and create a revolution in the way education is pursued and delivered. The programme is in constant evolutions, as Learn More more teachers use the technology. Madsen is proud of their To find out how Polycom solutions can help your organisation, accomplishments and vindicates, “VUC applies modern visit us at www.polycom.co.uk or speak with a Polycom Account technology and embraces the world students live in. These Representative. innovative tools are today an integral element of our teaching, and a natural part of the learning process.”

About Polycom Polycom is the global leader in open standards-based unified communications (UC) solutions for telepresence, video, and voice powered by the Polycom® RealPresence® Platform. The RealPresence Platform interoperates with the broadest range of business, mobile, and social applications and devices. More than 400,000 organizations trust Polycom solutions to collaborate and meet face-to-face from any location for more productive and effective engagement with colleagues, partners, customers, specialists, and prospects. Polycom, together with its broad partner ecosystem, provides customers with the best total cost of ownership, interoperability, scalability, and security for video collaboration, whether on-premises, hosted, or cloud-delivered. Visit www.polycom.com or connect with Polycom on Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn.

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