23 March 2017
By Bryan Smyth
bryan@TheCork.ie
enet CEO, Conal Henry. Photography by: Conor McCabe
Broadband provier ‘enet’ has announced a new contract to supply superfast broadband network connectivity to numerous schools in County Cork through the 100Mbs for Schools project run by the national educational and research network HEAnet on behalf of the Department of Education and Skills. Over 40 post-primary schools are now connected to enet networks in Bantry, Blarney, Carrigaline, Carrigtwohill, Cork City, Dunmanway, Kinsale, Midleton, Mitchelston and Skibbereen.
enet CEO, Conal Henry said:
“Digital applications can utterly transform the prospects of individual students and completely overhaul the entire educational landscape, so we are tremendously proud of our participation in the delivery of world-class broadband to these post-primary schools. For enet, this project is all about bringing next-generation connectivity to the next generation. We take significant pride in being able to provide schools with world class broadband connectivity.”
The enet solution is transforming the schools’ broadband connectivity, creating the capacity to revolutionise the educational experience for thousands of students. Already, schools are significantly benefiting from the technological jump – in some cases using adapted iPads instead of traditional textbooks as a means of delivering the curriculum.
Henry added:
“Work carried out in existing 100Mbs-enabled schools has shown that our high-quality broadband infrastructure facilitates a wide range of learning experiences. Students can now take a virtual tour of a museum to study a famous painting; they can chat and follow-up online with teachers; they can participate in virtual study groups with classmates or collaborators regardless of their physical location and they can even catch-up on a class that they missed in ‘real time’. Going forward, the wider use of technology will also ensure that students in smaller or more remote schools will no longer be disadvantaged in relation to subject-choice.”
Nationally the number of post-primary schools connected to enet’s infrastructure is over 450, with the company being the single largest broadband network supplier to the project.