Home /Customer Stories/ Leeds City College Creates Independent Learning Environment with Google Jamboard
In 2019, Leeds City College will be opening a brand new campus to revolutionise its digital, creative arts and health science provisions. As a result, the college has been looking for a tool to boost its students’ independent learning and upskill them outside of the four classroom walls. This tool needed to facilitate learning, increase engagement and do everything required within one app and board plus touch screen, android and upload capabilities. With a vast range of subjects and campuses, it was critical that the board allowed students to collaborate remotely and share ideas with ease.
Leeds City College is one of the UK’s largest FE establishments, offering a diverse curriculum to more than 20,000 students.
To find the right solution, the team from Leeds City College attended BETT and Google Next events, before coming across the Google Jamboard. The Jamboard is an interactive whiteboard developed by Google, as part of the G-Suite family. It has a 55” 4K touchscreen display and has compatibility for online collaboration through cross-platform support.
Following this, BenQ UK organised a loan unit to trial the board and G-Suite in an education setting. After a great reaction from both students and staff in the week trial, the college has now become part of the Jamboard ambassador scheme and purchased two units, one for the sports department and another that is used across the college, demonstrating its best use for education and events. The college will continue to roll out more boards across the departments in the run up to the new campus opening in 2019.
Google Jamboard integrates with G-Suite, allowing users access to popular Google apps and a host of interactive capabilities during a “jam” session. After signing in using an email address, students can draw, annotate, import and scribble on images or Google Docs, search the web, communicate with others remotely in real time via hangouts and everything is saved to the cloud. Leeds City College also noted the Jamboard’s flexible design with rolling stand and plug and play set-up, meaning teachers or students can “jam” on the go and move the board between rooms or across campuses.
“The Google Jamboard is the new leader and forward thinking approach to AV in the classroom, long gone are the days of projectors and whiteboards,” said Steven Hope, Head of Campus Operations and Technology Enhanced Learning Manager at Leeds City College.
“This board is the only thing on the market that ticks all the boxes for us and we are excited to see how it will continue to help students think differently about their work and give them the freedom to collaborate with others and learn independently.”
