Why Northfleet Technology College keeps choosing Wave9

Northfleet Technology College has worked with Wave9 for over six years and is now on its third three-year contract for connectivity, firewalling and filtering.

Garry Gardiner, IT Manager at the Kent secondary school, describes the relationship in straightforward terms. Wave9 gives Northfleet access to expert support without locking the school out of its own infrastructure.

“The best thing is, everything isn’t locked away from you.”

Northfleet can see what is happening, make agreed changes where appropriate, and call on Wave9 for more complex changes and support. For a school with a capable internal IT function, that balance is important. Garry does not want a black-box service.

“No matter how silly a question sounds, it isn’t treated that way.”

A practical IT environment

Garry took over IT management at Northfleet following an earlier Building Schools for the Future managed service arrangement. Like many schools from that period, Northfleet inherited a setup that had to be unpicked and adapted over time.

Northfleet has no fixed IT suites, so the device model is already flexible: one-to-one devices for Key Stage 4 and 5, shared devices for Key Stage 3, and a mix of Chromebooks, Windows laptops and iMacs. More of that environment now depends on cloud access.

Northfleet moved to Wave9 just before the first Covid lockdown. Since then, the school has renewed twice: once to upgrade from Sophos XG to XGS firewalls, and most recently to add Smoothwall Cloud Filter and Monitor with Wave9 managed support.

Smoothwall filtering and monitoring, managed through Wave9

The latest renewal was driven by a clear need to reduce administration overhead around off-site device filtering and monitoring. Northfleet students can now take allocated devices home, so the school needed a cleaner way to manage filtering and safeguarding alerts away from site.

The previous off-site device setup had become time-consuming to manage, with too much manual review falling back to IT. Smoothwall gave the school a better option for this specific requirement, while working alongside the Wave9 support Northfleet already had for connectivity, firewalling and filtering.

Garry can log simple categorisation issues directly with Smoothwall, but if something overlaps with firewalling, filtering or the wider school network, he can still go to Wave9.

“I know if I’ve got a problem of something firewall-related isn’t working, I can just log it with you guys,” he said. “You are managing the Smoothwall with us on top of everything else.”

Smoothwall Monitor has also reduced the manual safeguarding workload. Garry no longer has to review every monitoring alert himself before passing concerns through the school’s safeguarding process.

“With Smoothwall Monitor, I do not look at a single log.”

That has removed a significant amount of checking from IT.

Control close to the school

The move to Smoothwall has not removed the need for local control. Northfleet now has an on-site Smoothwall appliance, with the Sophos firewall behind it. Garry values that layered approach because it keeps network-level control close to the school.

He had previously seen the limitations of more centralised filtering arrangements, particularly where reporting became unreliable or changes took longer than expected.

“I was kind of adamant that I wanted some kind of on-site appliance again,” he said.

He also pointed to the Department for Education standards, which still refer to network-level filtering as well as cloud-based controls.

“There are people out there that will tell you you do not need an on-site appliance,” Garry said. “If you look at the DfE standards, they still say about having a network-level filter as well as having cloud.”

The useful point for Northfleet is the combination: local enforcement, cloud filtering for off-site devices, visibility for IT and support from Wave9 when the school needs help.

Support from people who understand the setup

Garry still values being able to pick up the phone.

In one recent example, the school was dealing with a phone system issue linked to a VLAN. The phone system sits on the school network but is managed through a separate PFI arrangement, making the setup more complicated than standard.

Garry created the VLAN but wanted to check that he had configured it correctly. He called Wave9, explained what he had done, and the team checked it with him.

“They popped on, they double checked that, no, you’ve done everything right, it’s all there,” he said. “Which is sometimes all you need.”

That kind of reassurance is part of the service. He wants access to people who can interrogate the setup, confirm what is happening and help him move forward.

“Being able to pick up the phone and speak to someone, and you having people on your helpdesk that know how to interrogate the Sophos stuff, that makes a big difference,” he said.

A service worth recommending

Garry has recommended Wave9 to other schools, including schools in and outside Kent. For him, that recommendation is based on the service he has seen over time.

When asked how he would describe Wave9 to another school, his answer was simple.

“It’s a very good service and it has done exactly what we wanted, and it’s not been an issue.”

For school connectivity, firewalling and filtering, that is often exactly what schools want to hear. As more systems move off site, the school internet connection supports teaching, communication, safeguarding, telephony, MIS access and everyday administration.

“They want stability,” Garry said. “Your internet connection is your important thing. Especially now with more and more and more that’s just off site.”

With Northfleet expanding and adding new teaching space, that need for stable, visible and well-supported infrastructure will only increase.

Wave9 gives Northfleet the mix it needs: control for the school’s IT team, expert support when needed, and a service stable enough to keep renewing.

At a Glance

• Kent secondary school with sixth form provision
• Wave9 customer for over six years, now on its third three-year contract
• WaveConnect connectivity, with WaveProtect firewalling and filtering
•  Smoothwall Cloud Filter and Monitor added for off-site device filtering and monitoring, with Wave9 managed support
• Co-managed approach giving Northfleet visibility and control
• Layered filtering with on-site appliance and Sophos firewall
• Reduced manual safeguarding triage for IT
• Direct access to technical support when needed
• Stable service trusted enough for repeat renewals and peer recommendations