Power Protection FEATURED ARTICLE

We’ve discussed in the past how power failures can affect the educational sector, but lately, it seems that there are tons of outages affecting educational institutions nationwide.

For instance, a couple of weeks ago, a brief power outage knocked out the majority of a Michigan-based college, leaving students to resort to studying in cramped corners of the campus that morning and forcing professors to cancel some classes. A University Police spokesperson, Diane Brown, revealed that it was believed a nearby outage at a DTE Energy substation sparked the one that affected students campus-wide. While Brown added that the campus “is often able to regain power quickly because it has the ability to receive electricity from multiple substations,” this is certainly no risk to still try and take.

Just this morning, in fact, the University of Kansas experienced a power outage that put daily campus affairs on hold (and no, it wasn’t some sort of late April Fools’ Day joke). While the power has been fully restored, it left the Student Center and several other buildings on its northern and central campus areas in the dark. The outage was traced to a power cable in the Student Center from Substation 2 that had burned out.

Even more, the power outage resulted in a power surge, which caused servers in the campus’ IT building to fail, which thus affected Internet across the campus. Reportedly, college officials claim that IT has already restored Outlook, Blackboard (News - Alert) and Internet services for all of its students on campus.

When it comes to battery backup and surge protection in education, you’ve got to ask yourself one vital question: Who’s depending on your school’s power?

As we’ve clearly seen from the above, educational institutions are no exception when it comes to power-related problems. They can be affected by voltage spikes, power surges, brownouts and blackouts – and there’s no telling when they’ll strike. For college students who are paying for their education, missing classes because they were cancelled due to a power failure is simply unacceptable. This is why many educational institutions rely on Minuteman UPS/Para Systems (News - Alert) to keep them up to speed.

Among the many offerings Minuteman has for the educational sector (including non-critical/peripherals, small/medium phone, network and security systems, large phone, network and security systems and enterprise-wide systems and extended backup battery runtime), are the MMS7120RCT 12 Outlet Surge Protector, which comes fully stocked with rotating outlets designed for connecting multiple transformers and phone, fax, modem and coax protection.

Also, consider the PRO700LCD Line Interactive UPS, which handles small to medium capacity equipment loads featuring an LCD display showing UPS and power status, battery runtime and desktop/laptop workstations.

When it comes to protecting the power in your educational institution, be the class pet – not the class clown.

To learn more about Minuteman’s power solutions for education, click here.