Mississippi Department of Education Initiates First Statewide Access to Multimedia Curriculum and Professional Development Using Cisco Technology

NECC, Philadelphia, PA, June 28, 2005 - Cisco Systems® today announced that the Mississippi Department of Education will install Cisco's Content Delivery Networking (CDN) solution to support IP video distribution for their Project Stream Initiative. The vision of the Project Stream Initiative is to provide access to high bandwidth video and multimedia educational content statewide to 800 K-12 schools. Phase one of the roll out will include every school district seat in Mississippi. As a result, the Mississippi Department of Education will be able to create, manage, store and distribute video materials to every district across the state.

Today's announcement was made at the National Education Computing Conference (NECC) in Philadelphia, where Cisco (booth # 1630) is demonstrating its portfolio of networking solutions that help schools achieve educational excellence and improve administrative efficiency.

"The Mississippi Department of Education will be the nation's first state to bring the highest quality of content delivery to every school, regardless of a district's current capabilities," said Dr. Bonita Potter, associate state superintendent, Mississippi Department of Education. "In partnership with Cisco Systems, we are able to bring the best quality of services, resources and curriculum to our administrators, teachers, and parents, all at the same time. Through the innovative use of technology, we have been able to do so much more as a state education department, even with less budget afforded to us."

Project Stream will give schools instant access to a host of video, multimedia and learning support materials from any classroom in the state. Phase two of the project involves pushing out content to district offices in order to provide school administrators with consistent information regarding national and state-mandated accountability programs, such as No Child Left Behind and conference sessions. For teachers, it will provide additional professional development opportunities. For students, it will provide curriculum tools for remediation initiatives around the high school subject area examinations. Phases one and two of the implementation are concurrently underway, with completion expected in August 2005.

"Our work with the Mississippi Department of Education is a powerful example of Cisco's commitment to help improve the use of technology in schools," said Charles Fadel, global lead, education, for Cisco Systems. "By using IP technology for media distribution, every school in the state can have access to effective learning tools without the limitation of physical media distribution. This helps ensure that every student has access to the best possible resources which significantly improving the learning experience for pupils and the quality and diversity of the material available to help teachers."

IP-based solutions are among the portfolio of offerings that Cisco is demonstrating this week at NECC to help educators to 'create truly connected schools, and be part of a connected community'. Cisco will be displaying its education product portfolio including:

• Cisco Network Solutions for Education
• Cisco Direct Line Solution for K-12
• Cisco IP Video Conferencing for K-12 Solution
• CiscoSecure Wireless Solution for K-12
• Cisco Networking Academy

The entire suite of Cisco's K-12 solutions, programs and resources are now available. More information on Cisco's Education Solutions can be found at www.cisco.com/en/US/strategy/education/index.html.

This solution was developed and installed by Cisco partner, Business Communications, Inc. and video solutions integrator, Time 2 Market using its product, Producer Connect.