Wireless - Pioneering Free Internet Access Scheme

Free internet access for up to 1,000 homes in local area

Pennine Telecom are proud to be providing a pioneering new scheme to provide free wireless internet access across East Bury.

Known as a Community Wireless Project, the scheme will be hosted and managed by Broad Oak Sports College and sees the installation of a wireless ‘cloud’ providing seven schools and up to 1,000 homes in the area with free wireless internet access.  It is believed to be one of the first schemes of its kind to be launched in the UK.

Co-funded by the school and local council, the £140,000 project follows research that revealed up to 40 per cent of pupils in the area had no access to internet in their homes. Upon completion of a pilot wireless connection, the service will be installed to serve up to 1,000 homes in the local area by 2009.

Engineers from Pennine Telecom will be installing outdoor wireless access points to lampposts across East Bury, which will deliver a connection speed of up to one mega-byte per second for surrounding homes. As connections are only accessible for pupils in the area, users will enjoy consistent download speeds with all traffic running through a hub in the high school to ensure secure and filtered access.

Belinda McGee at Pennine Telecom said: “This is an exciting project which will be of great benefit to pupils, their families and the local community.  It captures just how significant e-learning has become and it's a great initiative to make this platform available to all pupils.”

Pennine Telecom worked alongside PC World Education on this project.  The launch of the Community Wireless Project follows a separate initiative, which has seen PC World Education partner with local schools to provide access to discounted laptops. It forms part of the Government's 'Universal Home Access' initiative that looks to provide net access to the country's 2 million poorest children.

Neil O’Connor head teacher at Broad Oak’s said: “It’s a great investment for our students. We worked with PC World Education to ensure that our students gain access to computer hardware by providing free and discounted laptops. However, without access to a stable and reasonably fast internet connection students are severely limited in what they can do. With help and guidance from Pennine Telecom we have the most practical, efficient and reliable solution.”