Wifi Revolution

Kirkwood Community College (KCC), the third largest college in the state of Iowa, has selected Foundry Networks to complete a multi-campus network infrastructure redesign.

 

Foundry’s networking solutions have been installed across campus in an effort to support the KCC’s growing student base as well as propel their distance-learning program with the advantages of online multimedia courses.

 

Growth through technology is the focus for KCC and the decision to select Foundry Networks’ (News - Alert) solutions was to ensure that the college’s next generation network is future-proofed while also providing value and a competitive edge for students and faculty.

 

KCC is growing from 15,000 students and faculty members, so a complete network infrastructure overhaul was necessary in order to provide distance learning for students dispersed around the state.

 

Through the network redesign, KCC is also able to fulfill its mission of identifying ways to offer education to the broader community. In order to make distance learning appeal to the masses, the college leveraged Foundry’s convergence-enabling products to provide many of their courses though Webcasts and online discussion boards.

 

According to Jon Neff, executive director of information technologies for KCC, the distance learning program is an essential part of the College’s success and many of its students cannot be physically in the classroom on a scheduled basis because of family, life and work obligations.

 

Neff continued that after a careful evaluation of numerous vendors’ offerings, KCC determined that Foundry Networks’ solutions were ideal for the distributed student base and large campus network upgrade. Foundry had the price-for-performance, scalability, reliability and quality that KCC required to successfully handle more than 15,000 users in its mission-critical and intensive environment.

 

In an effort to differentiate its offerings from that of competing schools nearby, KCC deployed Foundry’s IronPoint wireless LAN infrastructure throughout every building on its 12 distributed campuses. This technology provides students and faculty with always-on and ubiquitous access to network resources from anywhere on campus.

 

Bob Schiff, vice president and general manager for Foundry Networks’ enterprise business unit noted that Foundry’s solutions will provide KCC with a cost-effective and highly scalable integrated network that delivers reliable performance for their current and future networking needs.

 

Schiff went on to add that the KCC network is an excellent example of how technologically savvy educational institutions are leveraging Foundry solutions in order to build advanced networks that enable innovative teaching methods and offer students flexible access to information throughout the campus.

 

Educational institutions are in an area where technological advances must be embraced and integrated into the offerings that the institution provides or they cannot be competitive. Those students looking to receive their education want access to the same technology that they will encounter in the workforce and anything less would be a sub-standard educational experience.

 

Implementing something like Foundry Networks’ solution is not only innovative and progressive, but will also help propel Kirkwood Community College’s image in the eyes of prospective students.

 

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