The expertise of a whole team at a fraction of the cost

Trinity College are a theological training college in Bristol offering undergraduate, graduate, and postgraduate study options.

Following the resignation of their IT manager, Trinity College had a decision to make between employing someone else internally or outsourcing their IT (or a combination of the two). Trinity were keen to find a solution which offered both strategic input and hands-on technical know-how, and as a result chose to go for the outsource option on the basis that they would have a range of expertise to call on from within an IT company. Premieredge was contacted following a strong endorsement from an organisation operating in a related sector and were offered the contract due to their technical competence and shared values.

Full infrastructure change to bring the college up to date

Trinity College were operating using a bespoke built Linux system which had not been updated for many years. Much of the college’s IT infrastructure was outdated, and in order to enable the college to work effectively moving forward, Premieredge recommended and installed more than 20 new PC’s and a new server as well as replacing the firewall, wireless Access points (WAPs) and switches.

Flexible working and teaching

Premieredge installed Office 365 and migrated Trinity’s emails to Microsoft 365 and their data to Sharepoint. This migration, in combination with the infrastructure changes, enabled staff who wanted to work from home to be able to do so. In addition, Premieredge installed Logitech Meetup systems to enable Trinity College to offer blended learning, with some students attending classes in person while other students join classes online from their homes. In this way, Trinity College is able to fulfil their commitment to offering a learning community to all their students.

‘We awarded Premieredge our IT contract because we were impressed with both their technical competence and their willingness to work with us on the transition from our existing systems. Most of all, what we appreciate in Premieredge is their collegiality and the fact that they are on-hand whenever we ask for their help. Premieredge are as close to being our IT director and team as we could get without employing a whole team.’

Andrew Lucas, Executive Director, Trinity College Bristol