The Challenge
In its 20 years of operation, GCC has grown rapidly from 16 children and two teachers in 2000, to its current enrolment of 1100 students. When the current principal joined GCC in 2008, he had a vision to build the college’s innovative learning programs & success on technology.
From Prep, students have access to iPads and computers and from Year 2 to Year 12 every student has access to a laptop. Every secondary student is issued with a MacBook for their own use both at school and at home.
“Schools are a hub of activity; they never stay the same and things are moving all the time in our IT environment. We were looking for a one-stop networking solution and a product that would free up the IT team from repeatedly solving the same networking problems,” Roland Munyard, IT Manager, Glasshouse Christian College says.
GCC had tried four vendors’ Wi-Fi solutions, without success. It was a difficult architectural environment for Wi-Fi, with different building materials and spaces in use across the campus. GCC had also found that Apple devices were “notoriously sticky” once they connected to an access point (AP), which caused connectivity problems for students and teachers moving around the campus.
“We needed a consistent connection with decent transfer speeds. We could get kids to stay connected, but they just weren’t getting the throughput they needed in the classroom,” Joshua Whysall, Glasshouse Christian College’s Network Administrator says.
The school’s rapid and organic growth had also resulted in a complex and diverse wired core & edge network topology, which made it difficult to deploy new devices and identify and troubleshoot issues.
