In the past, the number of spectators allowed into the ceremony at the Town Hall has been limited due to the space available. As a result, graduates were often only allocated two tickets for family members to watch their loved ones being presented with their degrees.
Then Anne-Marie Greenwood, Telephone Service Manager at the University, attended a seminar about Canopy in Pennine’s Business Centre in Bury, Greater Manchester.
She was impressed with the technology and immediately saw the potential to greatly expand the numbers of people able to watch the ceremony in real time.
The Canopy system transmits data between remote sites and the only criterion is that there must be near line of sight between sites. Pennine engineers installed one antenna on the Town Hall and the other on the University building a few hundred yards away.
Live video and audio footage of each graduation ceremony was beamed from the Town Hall to a large screen in one of the University’s halls.
Anne-Marie Greenwood explained: “Lots of students want to bring along more of their families to watch their degree ceremonies but there isn’t enough space to accommodate them.
“Now we can invite them to drop in and watch the occasion live on video in our large lecture theatre.
“I think we are one of the first universities in the country to do this. We also plan to use the Canopy system to link the University’s main communications system with other local sites, as and when needed.”
“This application just shows the versatility and potential of Canopy,” said Ian Taylor of Pennine Telecom.
“The capacity is such that you can stream live video and audio in high definition in real time. It has far more bandwidth than a landline, for instance, and is a much more cost-effective solution.”