How a Midlands Schools Trust and Its MSP Strengthened Cybersecurity with RoboShadow

The unique cybersecurity challenge in schools: student-driven incidents vs external attackers

For the past couple of years, RoboShadow has been working with Sandwell Academy, a secondary school and sixth form with academy status located in West Bromwich, UK. For many schools, IT systems are supported by MSPs, in this case, the school is supported by  Level 8 Solutions. Level 8 has worked with Sandwell Academy, along with several other academies, nurseries, and secondary schools, for nearly two decades. Over that time, Level 8 has become a trusted, long-standing partner, managing everything from networks and firewalls to cloud services and endpoint security. 

In the realm of cybersecurity in education, there is a unique challenge. Unlike most organisations, where energy is focused on defending against professional external attackers, schools often face risks much closer to home. More often than not, it isn’t shadowy hackers breaching the systems - it’s the students themselves, probing networks out of curiosity, testing limits, and making mischievous attempts to exploit weaknesses in those systems.

The patching challenge in education: managing 50+ apps across student devices

For the trust’s IT lead,  Daljeet Kangh, the biggest headache was patching. Windows updates were pushed through SCCM, but with more than 50 applications used daily, keeping everything up to date was impossible.

The education model made the problem harder. Schools run on fixed budgets, expect predictable annual billing, and cannot justify enterprise-grade costs. Tools like Nessus or Qualys were either too complex, too expensive, or produced reports that required a full-time analyst to interpret.

“We need something affordable, simple, and billed once a year. RoboShadow fit perfectly.”

Finding a better way: Continuous monitoring with RoboShadow

When the trust first deployed RoboShadow, the IT team was sceptical.  “I thought, this can’t be right. It’s too affordable,”  Daljeet admitted. “But then it just worked. It showed me exactly which applications were vulnerable and what needed updating.”

RoboShadow’s clarity set it apart. Instead of lengthy documents, it produced AI pen test reports that even governors could read. Vulnerabilities were prioritised, actions were clear, and leadership could see progress in plain English.

"It's got enough information that is in the right place to provide what the customers need without overloading them with all sorts of different options" - Daljeet Kangh, Sandwell Academy Trust

This readability became essential in education, where insider threats from students can escalate quickly if overlooked. With RoboShadow, staff could prove compliance with Cyber Essentials, as well as measurable improvement against the risks being tested daily in the classroom.

Immediate impact: reducing critical vulnerabilities and shrinking the attack surface

Within weeks, RoboShadow became part of the school’s daily routine. The IT lead admitted becoming “obsessed” with reducing the critical count to zero.

“Every morning I check the top critical issues. The instant feedback when a fix removes risk is incredibly motivating.” - Daljeet Kangh, Sandwell Academy Trust

This daily discipline caused a great shift. Security stopped being about a once-a-year penetration test and became a continuous improvement cycle. Instead of waiting for an external assessor, the trust could see its attack surface shrinking in real time.

A tool for MSP success: improving client security visibility and reducing alert fatigue

For the MSP, RoboShadow was more than just another product - it was a way to give schools real security visibility without overwhelming them.

"All people want is visibility of their environment and the top ten offenders, the things that they should be focusing their time and effort on" - Mark Wilkes, Level 8 Solutions.

The MSP has since adopted RoboShadow across multiple clients, replacing legacy scanners and improving its competitive edge. The platform also ties directly into PSA tools, reducing alert fatigue by flagging key events only and ensuring remediation is tracked and completed.

The road ahead: protecting schools from insider threats and student hacking attempts

With more than 1,400 students on its network each day, the schools trust faces constant internal and external risks. In many ways, the biggest cyber threat sits inside the classroom - curious students testing the limits.

RoboShadow helps the trust and its MSP stay ahead, combining automated patch management, continuous vulnerability scanning, and readable reports that secure buy-in from leadership. The result is measurable progress, affordable protection, and peace of mind that every day the schools are safer than the day before.

For both the trust and its MSP, RoboShadow has become a cornerstone of their cybersecurity approach - proving that advanced protection doesn’t need to be expensive, noisy, or confusing.