Success Story

How PC Corp Became Canada’s Top Google Partner for Education

When a school board is looking to equip students and staff with new devices or software, the budget pressure is constant. There is never quite enough budget to cover everything, which means every procurement decision carries real weight. Google Workspace and Chromebooks have become a popular choice across Alberta's education sector because they stretch that budget further than most alternatives.

And when it comes to buying through a reseller, it's easy to assume they're interchangeable. The product is the same. The license costs what it costs. So you might be wondering: does it actually matter which Google reseller you choose? 
It does. And the recognition we recently received helps explain why.

 
Canada's Number One Google Partner for Education

When you're trying to stretch a tight budget across a school board of any size, who you buy from matters more than most resellers will tell you. The partner you choose determines what you have access to, who picks up the phone when something goes wrong, and how much expertise is actually behind the transaction. 

We were recently named the number one Google education partner in Canada, outranking national resellers that operate across every major province. As Tessy Pavlatos, our Education Accounts Manager, put it:

"For us to have that designation over all of the nationals and over other resellers in larger provinces like Ontario and Quebec, I think that's quite an accomplishment. We've been selling thousands of devices for many years, but we've never really reached this milestone." 

But what this recognition actually means for Alberta school boards goes well beyond the credential itself. 

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What It Means for Your School Board

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Being Canada's top Google education partner means Google comes to us. When a school board needs something, we now have direct access to resources, expertise, and support that other resellers may not even know exist.

"When you're on the map with Google, especially when you're number one, they reach out to you and say, here's some resources that we can offer to your customers," says Eldon Morrison, our Director of Sales. "All of a sudden, when a school board needs something, we have resources that somebody else might not even know exist." 

What does that look like in practice?  

Say a school board is considering whether to move from Microsoft Office to Google Workspace. It's a significant decision with budget implications that could run into the hundreds of thousands of dollars annually. Through our relationship with Google, we can bring their experts directly into that conversation to evaluate the environment, walk through the implementation, and assess any security considerations for student data. School boards get access to people who wrote the software, not just people who sell it. 

"We might have the expertise," Morrison says, "but if we don't, we've got a phone number of somebody we can call that probably wrote the software. The best technical support you could get." 

Why So Many Alberta School Boards Choose Google

Choosing the right device for your schools involves more than comparing price tags.  Here's why Google consistently comes out ahead when you look at the full picture.

  • Cost per student. A $300 Chromebook versus an $800 laptop means three students can be equipped for the price of one. For boards working with fixed budgets, that math matters.
  • Simpler IT management. There's no complex imaging process to manage. Everything lives in the cloud, which means less burden on IT staff from deployment through decommission. If a student's device fails, they can log into any Chromebook and pick up exactly where they left off.
  • Security. Google Chrome OS has a zero-incident record when it comes to ransomware. For school boards managing sensitive student data, that's not a minor consideration. 
  • Total cost of ownership. The Chromebooks we sell often come with a three-year warranty, so school boards can plan a realistic device lifecycle without surprise replacement costs landing in the wrong budget year. By contrast, Apple devices typically come with a one-year warranty, and extending that coverage to three years is expensive enough that many boards simply don't.

Getting these decisions right comes from knowing the environment, knowing the budget cycles, and knowing what questions to ask before a purchase order goes out. 

A Neighbour with the Resources of a National 

What this recognition really reflects is the trust that Alberta school boards have placed in us over a long period of time. We're in the same province as our clients. We come out and meet with them. We get to know how they operate, what matters to them, and what they're trying to accomplish. And then we do our best to deliver on that.

With a national provider, a school board is often dealing with a different account manager every year, someone who's probably never visited the school, probably based in another province, and managing the account as one of hundreds. We work differently. When a school board calls, they reach someone who knows their account, knows their history, and has a stake in getting it right.

"With us, they get the best of both worlds," Morrison says. "You're dealing with a regional reseller that sees you as a neighbor with the resources of a national."

If you're an Alberta school board evaluating your options for IT procurement, connect with us.

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