IP Telephony – the ability to use the Internet Protocol (IP) to place voice calls over the data network – is increasingly the technology of choice for business and government entities and, as a growing number of schools can now attest, is what is enabling them to make voice part of their technology mix. Specifically, IP Telephony yields the following benefits to K-12:
1. Lower total cost of ownership:
IP Telephony lets schools leverage their existing data infrastructure to drive network costs down and cost effectively deploy telephones in classrooms. IP Telephony also allows schools to lower network management and maintenance costs by moving them to a single network environment. Lastly, IP Telephony gives schools the ability to share applications across the network thereby cost effectively enabling features and functionality, which were not previously available or affordable.
2. Improve staff productivity and morale, improve district-wide operating efficiencies and reduce costs:
Relevant and intuitive applications such as Unified Messaging and Integrated Messaging enable teachers and principals to be more productive and responsive to time sensitive inquiries. These applications also yield hard cost savings to schools by reducing fax machine, cartridge, paper, and fax toll expenses. Messaging, IVR, Outbound Dialing, and Speech-Enabled applications, for example, greatly increase administrative office efficiencies and simultaneously help to improve parental notification and involvement.
3. Outreach:
IP Telephony solutions help schools reduce the digital divide by ensuring notification of, and access to, critical information in a language and form that all parents can understand. IP Telephony solutions also help to facilitate parent/teacher communications as well as intra and inter-district communications and collaboration.
4. Enhance School Safety:
IP Telephony solutions allow school administrators to proactively disseminate critical information to staff and parents during an emergency. IP Telephony also allows school administrators to communicate with teachers and staff anywhere on school grounds thereby dramatically improving response times and improving outcomes during emergencies.
5. Accelerate the Adoption and Utilization of Existing and Future Systems and
Applications:
IP Telephony helps schools achieve a higher return on existing system and application investments (e.g. online content including events calendars, lunch menus, emergency closures, etc…) by enabling users to access the information using voice as the interface.