Monash Gippsland Education Precinct

1. Monash Gippsland Education Precinct Presentation by: Neil Clarke Sahar Oujil Royce Gonsalves Information Technology Services Monash University Neil.Clarke@its.monash.edu.au Sahar.Oujil@its.monash.edu.au Royce.Gonsalves@its.monash.edu.au

4. Introduction • Gippsland Education Precinct being built in Monash University’s Gippsland campus in Churchill. • Due to open in February 2004 • $12 million initiative of the Victorian Government • $1.5 million allocated for Information Technology • Brings together major education providers in the region. • Monash University, Gippsland TAFE (Gipps TAFE), Kurnai College and Gippsland Group Training. • Post secondary educational centre for 750 senior secondary school, a shared facility for the senior secondary students and TAFE and university students.

5. Introduction Cont’d • Programs include VCE, Vocational Education Training (VET), TAFE courses, apprenticeships and university subjects. • Use of broadband technology to enhance outcomes in education. • GEP to fulfil the national broadband vision of a collaborative venture between commonwealth, state and territory govts and higher education sector. • The new Australian Research and Education Network (AREN) to provide a collaborative framework for sharing bandwidth between campuses. GEP to benefit from this.

6. Introduction Cont’d • Victorian Educational and Research Network (VERN) a project driven by the Victorian Universities and the CSIRO will complement and accelerate the fulfilment of the goals set out for AREN • Research Precincts, Schools of Rural Health, and other entities to be embraced into the shared broadband bandwidth architecture of VERN. • GEP will become part of the VERN shared architecture as it rolls out to Regional Victoria.

7. Conceptual AREN Backbone

8. AREN viewed as hierarchical nested rings South East Mainland Sector Brisbane Source: HEBAC Report Canberra Sydney Melbourne Churchill

9. AREN & VERN Princes Backbone – Melbourne to Churchill Leg Canberra Source: Neil Clarke’s document on VERN Brisbane VERN Metro Loop VERN Clayton Precinct Loop Geelong VERN Dandenong Precinct Loop VERN Melbourne Local Loop VERN Berwick Precinct Loop VERN Warragul Precinct Loop Gipps Group Training AREN Princes backbone via Vic Track fibre VERN Moe Precinct Loop VERN Churchill-Morewell Precinct Loop – Gipps TAFE & Kurnai College Maryvale VERN Churchill Precinct Loop includes GEP & Kurnai College Future AREN backbone to Sydney

10. Major Concerns • Low educational and employment outcomes of youth in the Gippsland region. • High levels of youth disengagement and low level of transition from school to tertiary education, training and employment. • Drift of secondary students to institutions outside the region. • Elite students seek education outside the region because their needs cannot be met locally.

11. Key Objectives for Precinct • Develop a unique facility linking year 11 and 12 students with Gipps TAFE, Gippsland Group Training and Monash University to cater for a variety of interests and abilities. • Provide opportunities for innovative learning. • Provide a range of easily accessible pathways with enhanced career planning. • Provide an online environment that will enhance and extend new educational opportunities. • Implement ahigh bandwidth advanced Information and Communication Technology (ICT) hub to assist with teaching and learning.

12. Key Objectives for Precinct Cont’d • Provide accelerated programs for high achievers and elite students. • Provide support to indigenous students, allowing a successful transition from “Koorie Open Door Education” (KODE) and other schools. • Create opportunities for high achievers and elite students to take university subjects. • Develop high profile staff development programs. • Provide special vocational programs for school leavers.

13. Existing IT Infrastructure • Kurnai College and Gippsland Group Training operate from multiple sites. • Kurnai has campuses in Churchill, Maryvale and Morwell • Up to 130 networked computers at each site. • Wide area low bandwidth radio links between sites. • Student/staff records& admin/financials on DE&T providedserver. • Email via Edumail system provided by DE&T • 512 kbps Internet connection through an approved ISP. • One of 4 approved ISPs provides appropriate age based filtering for the under-aged students. No filters for staff.

14. Existing IT Infrastructure Cont’d • Gippsland Group Training operates from Warragul and Morwell. • Connection from each site to ISP via ADSL. • Student/staff records & admin/financials on a Win 2000 server • TAFE boasts a much larger network with links to remote campuses. • Main campus in Yallourn also referred to as Newborough. • 2M connection to the Internet. • Has trained IT staff. • Funding for new Precinct network allocated to TAFE.

15. Existing IT Infrastructure Cont’d • Monash has 7 campuses in Victoria • Main campus in Clayton. • Link to Gippsland via dual 34M redundant ATM connections • Link to other campuses via 155M and 622M ATM • Multiple Hospital sites in Melbourne & country Victoria • About 20,000 IP addresses seen • State of the art ATM and Ethernet network

16. Future IT Infrastructure • ICT Working Party formed to debate the requirements and come up with an appropriate network solution. • Project Manager appointed to manage the design, tender process, selection of preferred vendor and network implementation. • Wish list for the ideal new network • Audit existing TAFE and schools network, WAN connections & applications currently in use. • Questionnaire circulated dealing with: • What new applications and services should the new network provide ?

17. Future IT Infrastructure Cont’d • Email services • Authenticated access to Internet with appropriate filtering. • Administration facilities • Student services, ie portal services, WebCT, time tabling etc. • Transmission of large image and data files • Delivery of Distance Learning courses over the network • Online library services • Dialup access for staff and students • Transmission of video and voice over IP

18. Future IT Infrastructure Cont’d • Audio and video broadcast of lectures • Content streaming from external organisations – Museum, State Library, Art Gallery etc. • Protect individual institutions through separate firewalls

19. Transitioning to New IT Infrastructure • Overwhelming response for an enterprise network architecture. • Integrate data, voice and video • Flexibility to adapt to future technologies • Scalable, resilient and secure • Provide a high bandwidth core • Allow more schools to connect in the future • Provide all of the requested services • Allow future needed applications

20. Standard Operating Environment (SOE) • Standard Operating Environment (SOE) for staff and students. • Mix of school & TAFE students. • Mix of staff, teachers, managers, lecturers. • Challenge for the IT management to define and implement a SOE for desktop PCs and laptops for accessing a wide variety of applications for a disparate mix of user base. • Further complicated by the need to define one type for students and another for staff. • Student environment has to cater for both schools and TAFE. • Filtered Internet services for under-age students.

21. WAN Links to TAFE and School Campuses • Owned Fibre Infrastructure • High capital cost, hence constructed to link only nearby campuses: • Fibre link to Kurnai Secondary College in Churchill. • Fibre link to Gippsland TAFE campus in Morwell • Combination of owned and leased fibre services • Low capital, but high ongoing recurrent cost. • Creates flexibility to upgrade to higher bandwidth. • Ability to expand network to more sites.

22. WAN Links to TAFE and School Campuses Cont’d • Recommended combination of owned and leased fibre services. • Owned fibre links from Precinct to Kurnai College campus in Churchill. • Owned fibre link from Precinct to Gipps TAFE’s Mid Valley campus in Morwell and Kurnai College Maryvale campus. • Fibres leased from Vic Track to link Gipps TAFE’s campus in Morwell to the main TAFE hub in Yallourn. • Fibres leased from Vic Track to link Gippsland Group Training site in Warragul. • Monash could lease GEP fibre to link Churchill campus via Morwell on to Vic track to reach Berwick and Clayton.

23. Proposed WAN Fibre Layout Stage 2 Lawena School campus Kurnai Maryvale campus Gipps Group Training in Warragul TAFE Mid Valley Campus in Morwell Gipps TAFE main hub in Yallourn Vic track Fibre Vic track Fibre Warragul Traralgon Constructed fibre Kurnai College in Churchill Vic track fibre Constructed fibre Gippsland Education Precinct in Monash's Churchill campus

24. Internet Access for Precinct • Schools and TAFE view Internet access via AARNet using Monash’s network. • Monash could breach Telecommunications Act, by transporting third party data without a carrier licence. • AARNet primarily a Universities network; providing access to the Precinct, and thus to schools is a AARNet policy issue. • Potential overloading of Monash network with the added traffic from schools and TAFE could be an issue. • Unfiltered data from AARNet to the school students would also be an issue.

25. AREN viewed as hierarchical nested rings South East Mainland Sector Brisbane Source: HEBAC Report Canberra Sydney Melbourne Churchill

26. AREN & VERN Princes Backbone – Melbourne to Churchill Leg Canberra Source: Neil Clarke’s document on VERN Brisbane VERN Metro Loop VERN Clayton Precinct Loop Geelong VERN Dandenong Precinct Loop VERN Melbourne Local Loop VERN Berwick Precinct Loop VERN Warragul Precinct Loop Gipps Group Training AREN Princes backbone via Vic Track fibre VERN Moe Precinct Loop VERN Churchill-Morewell Precinct Loop – Gipps TAFE & Kurnai College Maryvale VERN Churchill Precinct Loop includes GEP & Kurnai College Future AREN backbone to Sydney

27. Future Internet Access Scenarios • Victorian Educational and Research Network (VERN) establishedvia an allianceofVictorian universities and CSIRO. • VERN will replace the Victorian universities’ wide area networks by deploying high capacity telecommunications infrastructure providing appropriate bandwidth between the individual sites of each university and CSIRO. • As VERN rolls out to regional Victoria, the upgraded capacity could allow GEP to access AARNet/AREN after appropriate policy change. • GEP could also use the VERN infrastructure to connect to a POP in central Melbourne for connection to an ISP.

28. IT Support for GEP based PCs and services • Roughly 150 PCs for students and staff. • Up to 40 laptops for staff • Initially no local IT staff to support IT services • All admin and student applications to be run from the TAFE’s Yallourn hub. • Internet access via TAFE • TAFE’s 2M internet to be upgraded to 8M • TAFE to provide Internet filtering for students

29. Proposed Network Layout Stage 2 Lawena School Campus Kurnai College Maryvale Campus Servers & applications run from Yallourn campus Gipps Group Training in Warragul TAFE Mid Valley Campus,Morwell Gipps TAFE main hub in Yallourn Vic track Fibre Vic track Fibre Warragul Traralgon Constructed multicore fibre 8 Mbit/s Internet shared access Cisco 4500 switch Kurnai College in Churchill INTERNT Gippsland Education Precinct in Monash's Churchill Campus Vic track fibre Constructed fibre

30. Gippsland Precinct Logical Network Servers in Newborough Precinct Local LANs Staff VLANs Student VLAN Central Site Cisco 3550 switch/router Cisco 4500 switch in GEP Cisco 3550 switch/router Cisco 3550 switch/router Internet Gipps TAFE Network 8 Mbit/s shared Existing Cisco 6500 switch in Gipps TAFE Yallourn Campus Kurnai Network Maryvale Core Precinct VLAN Monash Network Gippsland Group Training Network Kurnai Network Churchill

31. Challenges • Budget vs. reliability – High bandwidth core with resilience, but resilience is not possible in stage one implementation. • Lecture theatre facilities – Schools and TAFEs had the difficult task of agreeing on what might be the best fit-out for audio-visuals in lecture theatres. • Voice communications – should the Precinct run its own PABX? The decision was to use the existing University PABX. • Building cabling issues – ICT committee recommended saturation cabling, but the architect was concerned that the budget could permit only far fewer.

32. Challenges Cont’d • Telecommunications Act and carrier issues - Choosing the owned fibre infrastructure option for the Precinct requires a carrier licence. • The option of having the Precinct as part of Monash WAN was discarded as it could put Monash in breach of the Act. • Therefore it would be preferable for AARNet (a licensed carrier) to own and/or operate the local fibre links. • Precinct students – Could Precinct students have the same rights as Monash and TAFE students ? • Without these rights, Precinct students cannot have full access to existing facilities such as the Monash Library and TAFE online.

33. Challenges Cont’d • There was a need to establish a clear and concise policy position, at a strategic level, to define a Precinct student. • Funding for the network design and implementation – There were questions on who among the four partners had control over the distribution of the funds. OTTE nominated Gippsland TAFE to resolve this issue.

34. Q & A