The Smart Campus of the Future: Victoria University’s City Tower Powered by Cisco

Victoria University (VU) has established a reputation for embracing innovation and technology in pursuit of enhancing the student  and campus experience. VU’s decision to adopt the Block Model – where students learn subjects in intensive bursts – is a notable example of VU’s willingness to think creatively about long-standing challenges in education.

When VU recently consolidated its four Melbourne CBD campuses into Australia’s largest vertical campus offering both higher education and vocational learning, from pathway programs through to PhDs, it was determined to ensure the new vertical campus was future-proofed from a technology perspective. VU adopted a Cisco software-defined access (SDA) architecture to enable the digitisation of the City Tower recognising the new demands that will be placed on underlying technology platforms – primarily the network. These demands include the need for greater speed, processing more complexity, requirements for scalability (richer and more distributed data) and improved security. VU recognised that just having the digital infrastructure in place was not sufficient and embarked on a series of proof of concepts at its Footscray Park campus to understand how it could best use the power of advanced networks in innovating to:

• Improve wayfinding and navigation services for students and staff
• Improve room utilisation and the in-room experience (by monitoring occupancy levels and environmental conditions in real time)
• Ensure a safe return to campus for students after prolonged COVID lockdowns

The results of the proof of concepts and initial deployment of SDA at the new VU Vertical Campus can be found in the following case study which demonstrates how VU continues to innovate with world leading technology to enhance its student and campus experience.

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