Digital transformation at Staines Preparatory School

Microsoft 365 migration to Intune for Education - Cloud migration project with mobile device management (MDM) for a serverless school

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Customer: Staines Preparatory
School and Nursery
Location: Staines-upon-Thames, Surrey
Industry: Education

Solution: Microsoft Intune for
Education, RM Unify
Additional services provided: Remote Service Desk support, Microsoft 365 licensing

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Overview 

Situated in Staines-upon-Thames, Surrey, Staines Preparatory School is an independent, co-educational day school for children aged 2 to 11. Founded in 1935, the school pride themselves on offering high-quality education to the widest cross section of the community. 

The school delivers a broad, well-balanced curriculum, fostering engaged, independent learners. Students consistently perform above the national average in SATs and ISI inspections – the latest of which highlighted a “significant strength” in one area of its 2024 evaluation. 

Despite a modest exterior, the school boasts exceptional facilities, including a full-size multi-purpose sports hall with tiered seating auditorium and a dedicated science, music and ADT suite. Outdoor provision includes all-weather pitches, a yurt classroom, woodlands for Forest School, climbing wall and creative play areas, each contributing positively towards the outstanding learning within the school. 

Staines Prep provides a nurturing, family atmosphere through championing core values such as kindness, forgiveness, resilience, and curiosity. These values, part of “The Staines Prep Way”, form the moral code that is upheld by all pupils, staff and governors. 

Key outcomes

  • Streamlined device management – All Windows 11 devices and applications are now centrally managed through Microsoft Intune for Education, reducing manual overheads and ensuring consistency and efficiency
  • Reduced administrative overhead – Automation and centralisation have relieved IT staff from time-intensive manual processes, allowing focus on other tasks
  • Future-ready infrastructure – Complete removal of the legacy server and migration to the cloud has modernised the school’s IT environment
  • Improved security & compliance – With Intune policies, planned VLAN segmentation, and WPA3 Wi-Fi encryption, the school benefits from stronger data protection
  • Scalable and adaptable – The new environment is built to evolve with the school’s needs, enabling easy adoption of additional Microsoft 365 features and future cloud technologies
  • Knowledge transfer – Handover documentation and training provided to the school’s ICT Network Manager ensure sustainability and long-term confidence in understanding and managing the platform
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The challenge

Staines Prep, having worked with Primary Technology previously, contacted us about a solution for replacing their server infrastructure and introducing Windows device management as well as 3rd line technical support. At the heart of the challenge was an ageing RM CC4 server, still storing staff content and now over eight years old; well beyond warranty or support.

Device management was particularly problematic. The school were dependent on on-premises Group Policy, which limited flexibility and scalability, without any centralised oversight.

The absence of a centralised deployment mechanism meant such tasks were handled manually, increasing administrative overheads and creating operational inefficiencies as it is a time-intensive process, especially when preparing for large-scale rollouts, such as the planned device refresh for the move to Windows 11. Application deployment was not centralised, with core tools like Microsoft Office widely deployed but specialist software, such as Adobe Creative Cloud, still requiring manual installations for individual users.

Other challenges added further strain; a flat network design lacked segmentation between guest Wi-Fi, printers, and telephony systems, leading to potential performance issues and security concerns.
The school needed to move away from outdated legacy infrastructure and fully embrace the Microsoft Cloud with a modern, centralised solution.

The solution

After presenting suitable options, migrating to Microsoft Intune for Education was chosen as the strategic step forward, with the serverless vision favoured by the school’s Network Manager. A project scope was agreed for a migration to Microsoft Intune, alongside network configuration and security upgrades. This solution offered the school scalable device management, stronger security, and a more streamlined IT environment, fully aligned with modern classroom needs.

Microsoft Intune for Education is a cloud-based mobile device management (MDM) service designed specifically for schools. It simplifies how devices and applications are deployed, configured, and managed, giving administrators full control from a central dashboard, while ensuring compliance and security standards are met.

The project involved a transition to a serverless environment, with the complete removal of the ageing RM CC4 server and a migration to RM Unify and all data stored on the server to be transferred to the cloud.

Wi-Fi authentication was modernised, moving from RADIUS to Intune-managed SSIDs with WPA3 encryption. Careful configuration of some legacy systems was required to ensure they were integrated successfully with Intune. To further strengthen security and improve performance, the network will soon be reconfigured with VLAN segmentation, allowing guest traffic to be isolated from the school network.

All changes were carefully tested in a secure non-production environment before live deployment, with a select number of Windows 11 devices enrolled into Intune for a pilot rollout, used to validate the setup and resolve any issues. Documentation and scripts were provided to support further device onboarding over the summer.

The entire migration was carefully planned, managed and monitored by an internal project manager, ensuring that milestones were met on time and disruption to the school was minimised.

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Testimonial

  • The team at Primary Technology made the whole process run smoothly. Any unforeseen issues along the way were quickly remedied and I felt well supported throughout the project. The Support team's knowledge and technical abilities enabled us to complete the project within the time scale first laid out in the project scope. I look forward to our next project working together.

    Andrew Merriman - ICT Network Manager

The outcome

The migration to Microsoft Intune for Education has transformed the school’s IT environment into a streamlined, secure, and future-ready platform. Following a successful pilot, the client’s ICT Network Manager took ownership of data migration and device enrolment, supported by comprehensive handover documentation and training. Our team and the school’s ICT Network Manager worked in great partnership - it was a pleasure to work with Andrew, who took on a large proportion of the workload.

The move to Intune has created a centralised platform for managing all Windows 11 devices, enabling efficient deployment of applications, updates, and security policies while significantly reducing administrative overheads. This transition not only saves valuable time for IT staff but also ensures consistency and compliance across devices.

By leveraging Intune’s advanced security features - such as conditional access, device encryption, and real-time compliance monitoring - the school can align with regulatory requirements including the UK Data Protection Act 2018 (DPA 2018) and GDPR, as well as having strengthened data security and minimised risk. Alongside this, enhancements such as the planned VLAN segmentation and WPA3 Wi-Fi encryption have modernised the network infrastructure, improving both performance and scalability.

This migration strengthens the school’s commitment to safeguarding data, enhances digital learning opportunities, and provides a platform that will evolve with their needs. The scalable, cloud-based approach not only supports day-to-day teaching and administration but also positions the school for long-term growth and innovation by unlocking additional Microsoft 365 and cloud capabilities for the future.

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