IBM and Jumbo support Dubai Women's College mobile computing initiative

IBM and Jumbo, IBM's business partner for PC products in the UAE, have worked closely with DWC to ensure that students get the latest technologies that are changing the face of the present learning environment.

'In the first year of this initiative, we rolled out 220 IBM ThinkPad notebooks followed by 360 notebooks last year. This year, over 1,000 students will be purchasing notebooks, which represents 85% of our student population,' said Jamie Stewart, Supervisor of Educational Technology. 'By next year, all of our students will be using IBM ThinkPad notebooks in their course work.'

This mobile computing initiative is one of the largest in the educational sector in the region. 'The success of our notebook program is not possible without the assistance of leading companies like IBM and Jumbo,' said Dr. Reed, Director of Dubai Women's College. 'Getting the right technology, competitive pricing, after-sales support and helping us plan for the future-all of this is critical in enabling us to reach our educational objectives.'

'Dubai Women's College continues its drive to embrace an enhanced learning environment where its students are involved in the process, where learning occurs at any time and any place, and where there is greater interaction between the students and the faculties,' said Sameh Farid, regional manager, personal computing division,
IBM Middle East. 'We strongly encourage other institutions in this region to adopt similar initiatives that can help them achieve what DWC has been able to achieve so far and prepare students for the workforce of the future.'

Since notebooks are as fundamental to the academic success of students as paper and pens, Jumbo is required to provide a rapid repair time. The Enterprise Systems Group at Jumbo has placed an engineer on campus to maintain a certain level of spare parts and stand-by machines. According to Arvind Agrawal, GM, IT Division at Jumbo, 'Our main value-add is in ensuring that students at this college are provided with maximum uptime. We have assured the college authorities that the turnaround time will be limited to two hours.'

'Notebooks are not an optional technology for us anymore. As the project has developed, courses and program curricula have been re-written with the assumption that students have access to the college network, the Internet and computing technology at all times. IBM and Jumbo have helped us reach that vision,' remarked Stewart.