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Client
Simonds Catholic College
Scope of work
Managed Services
Scope of work
K-12 Education
Location
Melbourne, Australia
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Overview

Simonds Catholic College is a secondary school for boys in the inner city of Melbourne, situated on the land of the Wurundjeri people. The college provides a broad and exciting curriculum to a diverse cohort of approximately 400 students from more than 40 nationalities. With a staff of around 65, the school operates as a small but vibrant learning community.

The school has high expectations and promotes intellectual rigour amongst its students, and they are driven by a deep belief that every student is capable of successful learning. Strong procedures are in place to encourage a school-wide, shared responsibility for student learning and to encourage the development of a culture of continuous professional improvement.

Fast Facts

  • Complete network switch refresh using HPE Aruba CX 6300 series switches and AP515 Wi-Fi access points, eliminating bottlenecks and future-proofing campus connectivity.
  • Implementation of Aruba Central Cloud Management, providing single-pane-of-glass visibility across wired and wireless infrastructure.
  • Integration of Aruba ClearPass, enabling automated security with intelligent device fingerprinting and role-based access.
  • Seamless transition to a modernised network infrastructure completed within tight academic year deadlines.

“We chose Atturra because they had the expertise, experience, and vendor relationship to support us through the migration. Projects at this scale are rare, so we needed to get it right. The fact that Atturra’s feedback on our designs aligned with HPE’s made us comfortable. Atturra is highly collaborative, and it feels like a partnership. They didn’t dictate a solution. Instead, they worked with us to find one that fit within our boundaries. We could meet the tight timelines because of transparent communication, realistic expectations, and Atturra’s effort to keep on top of escalations.”

Joshua Jennings, IT Manager
Simonds Catholic College

Business Opportunity

Simonds Catholic College was transitioning into a single campus and a new state-of-the-art building in late 2024. The facilities included a STEM Centre with advanced laboratories, specialised equipment, and collaborative spaces.

The school’s IT team were operating on an aging network infrastructure that would be unable to manage the demands of the new single high-tech campus. Outdated HP switches and legacy fibre infrastructure were creating bottlenecks, and were impacting their educational delivery. They recognised this was an opportunity to modernise the network infrastructure and uplift its capabilities to support advanced learning technologies.

With a tight deadline of just two months, the Simonds Catholic College team took a hands-on approach but wanted the assurance of an experienced technology partner to support them, as they undertook their most significant digital transformation project to date.

Having worked with Atturra previously, and knowing we were an award-winning HPE Aruba Networking Platinum Partner, the school’s team engaged us to provide strategic guidance, technical assurance, and support. Our role included assisting with solution design, facilitating the procurement of hardware, and ensuring the timely delivery of the network infrastructure to meet their ambitious transformation goals.

Solution

The upgraded network and infrastructure needed to be operational by the beginning of the new school term in January 2025. Meeting this short deadline required a highly collaborative and agile approach.

Atturra worked closely with the school’s IT team to understand their environment and ensure the solution aligned with both their immediate needs and long-term goals. We realigned with HPE Aruba and the school, incorporating Aruba CX 6300 switches, Aruba Central, and ClearPass—powerful yet manageable for their small internal team.

Facilitating multiple design revisions to fine-tune the architecture, Atturra worked quickly without compromising clarity or alignment. We maintained tight coordination with our technology partners throughout the process to secure lead times and ensure critical-path components were delivered to schedule. Familiarity with education environments helped anticipate potential challenges, allowing the team to plan ahead and stay on track.

Despite the condensed timeline, the project was delivered on time and to budget, and with minimal disruption to teaching and learning. Regular check-ins, flexibility around deployment windows, and a consistent point of contact ensured that Simonds Catholic College could stay focused on what matters most — supporting their students. Atturra also managed the negotiation of the college’s licensing and support agreements, enabling them to access more beneficial terms.

With the new infrastructure up and running, the Managed Services team took over the data centre, infrastructure hosting (NextDC), ongoing infrastructure support and vendor management.

Outcomes achieved

The successful implementation of the new network infrastructure has delivered numerous benefits across student and teacher experience and security, while laying the foundation for future-ready education.

Onboarding for new devices has been transformed into a zero-touch deployment process that reduces IT workload and user frustration. Teachers now have confidence that when students enter the classroom, they will experience reliable and fast connectivity, eliminating downtime and providing a smoother teaching environment.

Implementing Aruba ClearPass has enabled the school to analyse devices as they join the network, taking fingerprints and dynamically assigning them to appropriate VLANs based on device type. This segmentation allows for precise control and enhanced security across the network.

The upgraded network infrastructure has made the school IoT-ready and given it the confidence to progress its cloud-first strategy and move away from on-premise solutions.

Simonds Catholic School is better positioned to collaborate more effectively with the wider community, and they now have the technological foundation required to support an expanding student body while continuing to deliver exceptional education in a modern and inspiring environment.

Technologies

    • HPE Aruba CX switches
    • Aruba Central Cloud Management
    • Aruba ClearPass
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