success Stories we move

Equipping the schools of Drancy (93) with mobile devices was a campaign promise from the mayor, Aude Lagarde. The initial plan called for gradual deployment but the health crisis has changed that. The first lockdown, in March 2020, was accompanied by the closure of schools. As a result, many of the establishments found themselves caught off guard when a crucial question arose : how to ensure educational continuity?

While the situation remains uncertain at the end of this confinement, the mayor wishes to take the lead in order to ensure educational continuity. “This has led us to give life jackets to all children facing the new wave”, Mrs Lagarde explains. Thus, unprecedented nationally, the city council decided to equip its 218 primary school classes with mobile computing equipment, with a UEM and a class management solution, for a budget of 2M€.

“This measure aims to ensure equal opportunities for all students, to fight against the digital fracture, and to guarantee educational continuity, regardless of the reason for the rupture (illness, pandemic, etc.)”, the mayor says.

To equip the schools of Drancy with new devices, the town hall went through a third-party reseller. But in order to bring such a large digital fleet to life, the municipality called on idruide and its distribution partner, CFI. It deployed the idruide solutions remotely on the 5,500 tablets in the workshop before distributing them in multiple waves in the city schools.

The first wave of deliveries took place in August 2020, initially involving 260 tablets for teachers. The second wave followed closely in September for CE1 / CE2 / CM1 / CM2 in the 20 schools of Drancy. Finally, the third wave took place in February 2021 for the CP classes of these schools, which represent 1,100 students.

The latter were equipped later because after consultations, it was decided to let teachers learn reading and all the basics before adding a new learning tool for children.

Thanks to the idruide / CFI partnership, it was possible to respond quickly and efficiently to the needs of the town hall by deploying fleet management and classroom management solutions on the digital devices distributed by CFI in the schools.

“A project of this scale was completely new. We were moving step by step, depending on the issues that arose”, Aude Lagarde says. “The collaboration with idruide has been fruitful. Their teams were very responsive. Most of them are also from the education environment, which brings real knowledge of the field.”

The mayor has invested over five years (the entire primary cycle) to benefit from the idruide Education software suite and its permanent innovations. Among the new features developed to meet the challenges facing Drancy, idruide has created an Internet filtering solution to protect students when they browse online.

Indeed, with the desire to provide one tablet per student that they can bring home, it was necessary to ensure that they did not come across shocking, offensive or illegal content on the school material. Web Secure makes it possible to filter the online browsing of students, whether they are inside or outside the school.

Filtering is carried out both at the device level and at the WiFi level. No equipment or software are required to install it : Web Secure is set up with a simple configuration. Web Secure offers different levels of filtering to allow better control of Internet use. They’re all based on educational credentials, including Toulouse 1 University.

In addition, to respond to the municipality’s concerns about children’s screen time, idruide also developed a tool to curb the use of school tablets, in order to prevent excessive use. It’s a new feature of the UEM Stonehenge. 

Undergraduate schools in Drancy do not have an ENT or an educational network. Therefore, idruide’s teams imported the list of all students and teachers users to Stonehenge, for an easier management of profiles and class sessions. Thanks to this, it’s possible to make the morning call automatically, or to create level groups from assigned tablets and student profiles.

During all of its projects, idruide supports its users with a series of training courses until they are fully familiar with our digital solutions. In the case of Drancy, Pierre Macri, one of the co-founders of the company, is responsible for training the teachers in the use of Roome, the classroom management solution.

“Training is a real plus”, the mayor acknowledges. “This, along with the support by the idruide teams, doubled the number of people trained in record time.”

The Academic Delegation for Digital Education (DANE) also organizes webinars to train eRUNs (teachers for digital resources and uses) who can in turn train their colleagues.

“Today, it is a success. Almost 95 % of our students have a tablet with softwares that ensure pedagogical continuity. Teachers are trained and manage tools promoting differentiated pedagogy. All of this in a safe environment and with a control of uses”, Aude Lagarde rejoices.