Services · PenwinTV
PenwinTV: digital signage for schools and colleges
The notice taped to the glass in the entrance hall, the room change written by hand, the menu printed every month: a school communicates all day long, and nearly always on paper. PenwinTV moves it onto screens that are updated from the browser, with information expiring by itself when its time slot ends; and because content is downloaded before it is shown, the screen keeps playing even if the internet goes down. Installation is scheduled for non-teaching periods and the service is backed by 24/7 monitoring and technical support that responds within 4 working hours.
Email info@penwin.org with the number of screens at your school and we'll prepare your PenwinTV proposal.
What digital signage is for in a school
PenwinTV replaces the paper workflow with screens that are updated from a web dashboard, with no more reprinting or walking round the building putting sheets up. The operational advantage lies not in the screen but in the workflow: whoever publishes no longer depends on the printer or on someone going downstairs to stick the notice up. These are the recurring uses worth keeping in mind when deciding where each screen goes:
- Entrance hall and main entrance: notices for families, school office opening hours, admissions information and reminders for the day.
- Corridors and classroom entrances: timetables, room changes and cover, which is where being able to update in minutes makes the most difference.
- Dining hall: daily and monthly menus and information about the service.
- Staff room: internal memos, meeting calendar, cover duties and staff meeting notices.
- Events and celebrations: open days, festivals, graduations and class projects.
Local playback: the screens keep playing whatever happens to the network
PenwinTV downloads the content to the playback device ahead of the scheduled time. When the moment comes to show the image or video, the file is already at the screen and plays at full quality, without depending on the bandwidth available at that instant. If the internet goes down, the day's schedule carries on and any published changes sync as soon as the connection is back.
Real-time monitoring completes the picture: PenwinTV reports the status of each screen, receives its heartbeat and logs issues, so a screen that has stopped syncing is spotted from the dashboard and not because someone happens to walk past and see it frozen.
How content is organised: library, playlists and scheduling
PenwinTV separates content into three levels, and that separation is what avoids repeated work: a central media library where each file is uploaded just once and is available to every screen; reusable playlists, which set what is shown, in what order and for how many seconds each item stays up, and can be assigned to several screens without duplicating files; and a broadcast schedule by screen, date and time slot, so the same screen shows one thing in the morning and another at the end of the school day.
- Media library: images, videos and documents in a central repository for the school.
- Playlists: reusable, with a configurable duration for each item.
- Broadcast scheduling: by screen, by date and by time slot.
- Monitoring: status, heartbeat and issues in real time.
Multiple screens and multiple schools from a single dashboard
PenwinTV is natively multi-tenant: a school group, a university with several campuses or a group of vocational training centres manages its whole fleet of screens from the same environment while keeping each school's content separate. Two layers are combined: the institution's shared content, which is prepared once and distributed, and each site's own content, which the local team manages.
Management is cloud-based and accessed from the browser at https://tv.penwin.cloud (in Spanish), with nothing to install on staff computers. Real-time monitoring shows the status and issues of every screen in a single view, which is what makes it feasible to maintain dozens of screens spread across several buildings.
Parishes and communities
PenwinTV is also used in parishes and communities, with the same library, playlist and scheduling set-up: times of services and parish office hours, notices to the community, the calendar of activities and specific content for key dates in the liturgical year. With a handful of screens and a team that is not technical, two things matter most: publishing from the browser, with no software to install or maintain, and local playback, so that the screen in the entrance works just the same with whatever network the premises have.
Data, security and support: PenwinTV as part of the school's infrastructure
PenwinTV encrypts information in transit and hosts data in the European Union, with multi-tenant isolation between institutions. These are the three points the data protection lead asks about before approving a cloud service, and PenwinEdu provides written documentation on all three so the school can add it straight to its processing record.
What sets PenwinTV apart from a generic signage platform is who deploys it. PenwinEdu specialises in education and has spent more than twelve years managing the technology infrastructure of schools and colleges in Spain. Today the company manages more than 300,000 daily connections, 600 TB of internet traffic and more than 1,200 switches and firewalls, with Aruba, Meraki, Ubiquiti, Cisco and TP-Link equipment and integrations with Google Workspace, Microsoft 365 and LDAP/Active Directory. The screens are installed on a network that the same provider knows and maintains, with a technical support response within 4 working hours, 24/7 monitoring and offices in Sant Cugat del Vallès (Barcelona), Madrid and Jaén. Installations that involve work in classrooms, corridors or cabling are concentrated in non-teaching periods, so the school year starts with the screens already up and running.
The PenwinTV quote is calculated according to the number of screens and playback points at the school: email info@penwin.org saying how many screens you have or want to install and in which spaces, and you will receive a proposal broken down by point.
Frequently asked questions
Which screens can be used with PenwinTV?
PenwinTV works with the screens the school already has, whatever their make and model: TVs in the entrance hall, corridor monitors or large-format professional displays. Each point plays through a media player connected to the screen, which downloads the content and shows it locally, so all each location needs is power and network access. PenwinEdu reviews the existing screens before roll-out and proposes how the points should be distributed; you can ask at info@penwin.org.
What happens if the internet goes down at the school?
The screens keep playing as normal. PenwinTV downloads the content to the media player before broadcast time, so playback is local and the day's schedule runs exactly as planned. Changes published during the outage sync as soon as the connection is back, and monitoring keeps a record of the episode: the dashboard logs the screen that has stopped sending its heartbeat and raises an alert, without waiting for someone to notice on the ground.
Who can upload content to the screens?
School staff who have been given access to the PenwinTV dashboard at https://tv.penwin.cloud (in Spanish). Management is cloud-based and done from the browser: images, videos and documents are uploaded to the school's media library, playlists are put together and broadcasts are scheduled. Because PenwinTV is natively multi-tenant, each school works within its own space, with its library, playlists and screens kept separate from everyone else's.
Can different content be scheduled on each screen?
Yes. PenwinTV scheduling is set by screen, date and time, so the entrance hall can show notices for families while the staff room shows internal memos and the dining hall screen shows the day's menu. Playlists are reusable and carry a duration for each item, so the same content can appear on several screens without duplicating it in the media library.
Can it manage several schools at once?
Yes. PenwinTV is natively multi-tenant, designed so that an institution with several sites can manage all its screens from the same environment while keeping each school's content separate. It lets you combine the institution's shared content with what each site schedules on its own. Real-time monitoring shows the status, heartbeat and issues of the whole screen estate in a single view, without walking round the buildings.
Where is PenwinTV data stored?
In the European Union. PenwinTV hosts data in the EU and encrypts information in transit, and multi-tenant isolation keeps each school's content separate. Management takes place in the cloud from https://tv.penwin.cloud (in Spanish). PenwinEdu supplies that information as documentation for the school's processing record: data location, encryption and isolation between institutions are the first questions a data protection lead asks about a cloud service, and with PenwinTV they are answered in writing before the first screen is switched on.
How is PenwinTV different from a generic digital signage platform?
It is developed and deployed by a provider that specialises in education: publicly funded private schools (concertados), private schools, universities, business schools and vocational training centres. PenwinEdu has spent over a decade managing the technology infrastructure of schools and colleges across Spain. Today the company manages more than 300,000 daily connections and more than 1,200 switches and firewalls. The screens run on a network that PenwinEdu already maintains, with 24/7 monitoring and a technical support response within 4 working hours. Installations are planned around the school calendar, in non-teaching periods whenever the work requires it.
Let's talk about your school
Email us at info@penwin.org with details of your school, or fill in the contact form, and we'll reply with a specific proposal.