Microsoft Office 365
Customer Solution Case Study
Council Enhances Agility and Reduces Costs
with Customised Cloud Platform
Customer: Dudley Metropolitan Borough
Council
Website: www.dudley.gov.uk
Customer Size: 7,000
Country or Region: United Kingdom
Industry: Government—Local
government agencies
Partner: RM Education
Customer Profile
Established in 1974, Dudley Metropolitan
Borough Council is responsible for local
government services for more than
300,000 constituents in the borough of
Dudley in the West Midlands.
Software and Services
 Microsoft Office
− Microsoft Office 365
“As Microsoft Office 365 develops, soon students may
just need a good Internet connection to access school
collaboration tools. This increases learning
opportunities.”
Geoff Baker, DGfL Head of Service, Dudley Metropolitan Borough Council
Dudley Metropolitan Borough Council set up the Dudley Grid for
Learning (DGfL) to provide its schools with fully managed
information and communications technology (ICT) services. The
council’s private sector partner RM Education was chosen to
move its email to the cloud with Microsoft Office 365. The
council is now confident that it will reduce ICT costs, increase
agility, and enhance student learning.
Business Needs
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As part of its service to schools within the
local authority, Dudley Council first
procured the DGfL service in 1999. The
innovative service delivers, through a
private sector partner, fully managed ICT
to 106 schools across the borough. It
encompasses network infrastructure,
hardware, educational software, schools
management information systems (MIS),
as well as helpdesk, training, network, and
technical support. A key component of the
service is support for the school
applications, such as email and document
sharing software, used by 45,000 students
and 5,600 staff. DGfL is nationally
recognised within the education sector,
and a reference point for outsourced
educational ICT projects in the U.K.
RM Education—an ICT provider based in
the U.K. and the council’s private sector
partner since 1999—developed the current
DGfL platform based on Microsoft Office
SharePoint Server 2007. This provides all
Dudley pupils, staff, and teachers with
access to a secure online learning space
and collaboration tools. It also gives
parents web access to up-to-date and
relevant information about their child’s
achievement, attendance, and progress. Esafety is a top priority for DGfL, and RM
Education implements appropriate safety
monitoring policies, alongside training
sessions that help promote awareness of
online safety among pupils and staff.
As part of its commitment to providing
excellent ICT services through DGfL, in 2010
Dudley undertook a comprehensive,
European Union–compliant tender exercise,
resulting in RM Education retaining the
DGfL contract for a further 10 years. As part
of the new contract, the council required a
review of its current collaboration platform,
with the initial goal of upgrading its email
solution. Geoff Baker, DGfL Head of Service,
Dudley Metropolitan Borough Council, says:
“We wanted staff in particular to have a
more ‘business-like’ email system, with
access to the latest contact and scheduling
tools. The council also wanted to lay the
foundation for future upgrades with an
agile, cost-effective collaboration platform
that could meet current and future needs.
We are demanding clients and we wanted
to make sure that RM Education could
provide an offering it was confident about.”
Solution
RM Education provides Microsoft Office 365
migration and deployment services to the
education sector, and has a strategic
relationship with Microsoft. It uses this
insight to help education customers plan
and implement robust ICT strategies.
Dudley asked RM Education to evaluate
Google Mail and Google Apps for
Education, alongside Microsoft Office 365—
assessing both providers’ offerings against
criteria such as usability, functionality, ease
of management, and cost-effectiveness.
As part of its evaluation, RM Education
asked a group of teaching and
administration staff to evaluate the
strengths of the Google and Microsoft
offerings from a user perspective. Baker
says: “Staff input was critical because they
rely on email a lot and use it as their
primary collaboration tool.” While some
users were familiar with Google Mail from
personal use, the RM Education review
found that staff preferred Office 365 in
crucial areas. One important aspect was
the need to comply with the government’s
guidance on storing personal data in the
cloud. Baker says: “RM Education
confirmed that Microsoft could guarantee
that our data would reside in data centres
located within the European Union.”
Dudley chose to migrate its collaboration
platform to Office 365 based on advice
from RM Education and feedback from the
user group. Office 365 provides schools
with free email, instant messaging, group
video, voice chat, and online document
viewing and editing. Baker says: “RM
Education has proved it has expert
knowledge of the Office 365 roadmap. We
felt that this relationship would benefit us
and help us make the right long-term
decisions about the future of cloud-based
services for our schools.”
Benefits
With Microsoft Office 365, the council has
an agile cloud platform that supports
current and future learning and
collaboration needs. It can continue to
develop its learning platform, increasing
agility and applying the latest technologies
to enhance access and education.

Student learning is enhanced costeffectively. An example of innovation is
the development of the council’s vision
of students using their own devices to
access learning materials anytime,
anywhere. Baker says: “As Microsoft
Office 365 develops, soon students may
just need a good Internet connection to
access school collaboration tools. This
increases learning opportunities, but at
This case study is for informational purposes only. MICROSOFT MAKES NO WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, IN THIS
SUMMARY.
Document published November 2012
the same time has the potential to
reduce costs because we don’t need to
purchase local licences.”
 Customisable solution supports
enforcement of anti-bullying policy.
As a Microsoft Office 365 migration
specialist, RM Education was easily able
to customise Office 365 to meet the
council and schools’ comprehensive
anti-bullying requirements. Baker says:
“RM Education maintains filtering for
key words related to bullying and other
text that contravenes the council’s
acceptable use policies. Even when it
becomes common for pupils to use their
personal devices to access school email
and other applications, communication
will be monitored to ensure the safety
and protection of students.”
 Ongoing maintenance costs and
complexity are reduced. “Dudley
schools will soon have access to the
latest versions of Microsoft Office
applications, and updates to new
versions will be carried out automatically
in the cloud with Office 365. This should
remove the need for any system
downtime while software upgrades take
place,” says Baker.
 Cloud platform boosts flexible
learning. There are fewer barriers to
learning because Dudley staff and
students can access schools’
collaboration tools even when they’re
not at school. “If it snows, leaving pupils
and staff stuck at home, they can
continue to learn and communicate with
each other through Microsoft Office
365,” says Baker. Dudley is also looking
to make use of the instant messaging
services in Microsoft Lync, part of Office
365, to support student learning
through video conferencing and
desktop application sharing.