New Hampshire School District Deploys Unified Network for BYOD

Oyster River Cooperative School District (ORCSD) in New Hampshire has implemented a unified wired and wireless access network to support its bring-your-own-device (BYOD) initiative together with district-owned devices.

The district recently implemented a BYOD policy to take advantage of the increasing number of mobile devices students were bringing on campus, enabling them to use the devices to access educational resources. But the district's network couldn't support the growing number of tablets, smartphones, laptops and e-readers competing for bandwidth, and it couldn't provide the same level of network access for both the personal and district-owned devices. It was time to upgrade.

The district evaluated its options and chose a solution from Aruba Networks. The new network consists of Aruba Instant contoller-less access points (APs), the AirWave Network Management System, the ClearPass Access Management System and Aruba Mobility Access Switches.

According to the company, the district chose Aruba for its "ease of deployment and simplified management," as well as its ClearPass Access Management System, which profiles the users and devices on the network to control their access privileges.

"Our overall goal is to enhance student learning and enrich classroom lessons," said Josh Olstad, IT director for ORCSD, in a prepared statement. "Our students are already bringing multiple devices to school, so it makes sense for us to allow these devices to access the network and the valuable educational resources that reside on it." According to Olstad, the new unified network supports that goal by enabling students and teachers to connect their personal and district-issued devices, so they can access those resources securely over the network.

Oyster River Cooperative School District is a K-12 public school district serving approximately 2,000 students from the communities of Durham, Lee and Madbury, NH.

About the Author

Leila Meyer is a technology writer based in British Columbia. She can be reached at [email protected].

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