Delgado Community College (Delgado) provides a learning environment that’s geared towards helping students achieve their educational, career, and personal goals. They rely on technology to support that mission, so when spotty wireless coverage began affecting their students and staff, Delgado reached out to us for help. Using our extensive networking and higher education expertise, we were able to improve wireless coverage across all their campuses, as well as simplify network management and visibility for their IT team.
The situation, needs, and challenges
Delgado’s IT team realized they had an issue when they started receiving more calls about poor wireless signals across their seven campuses. They knew it meant they had coverage gaps, but finding those gaps was difficult with the tools and documentation they had available. Delgado wanted to avoid wasting time and budget by guessing where new access points (APs) were needed, so they asked us to meet with them and assess their environment.
- Lack of Documentation: Previous deployments were not well documented, and many APs used default names so they couldn’t be mapped to their campus locations.
- Disparate Management: Two separate instances of Aruba AirWave (one being a legacy Dell-branded version) were being used to manage their wireless infrastructure.
- Lack of Consolidation: APs were reporting into two separate management platforms which made it difficult to get a full picture of their wireless environment.
- No Useable Heatmaps: Neither AirWave instance had complete floor plans loaded, so Delgado couldn’t generate heatmaps to identify heavy access or dead zones.
Delgado met with other IT companies, but came away thoroughly impressed with our level of knowledge and felt we were the right organization for them. After the initial meeting and assessment, our network engineer and account manager collaborated with the HPE/Aruba team to determine the best strategy for Delgado to address the issues and challenges they were facing.
The LTG solution
Our solution included three key components. Along with consolidating wireless management under a single instance of Aruba’s AirWave management platform, we would create a comprehensive wireless heatmap for their multi-campus environment. After creating the heatmap, we would provide a detailed recommendation on where additional APs were needed to address coverage gaps and work with them to refresh their wireless hardware to new Aruba appliances.
Within four weeks of our proposal, delgado approved us to move forward with our solution:
- Consolidate to one wireless network management platform: We began by deploying a single instance of Aruba’s AirWave management platform to consolidate wireless management, as well as transferred licenses for legacy hardware and loaded floor plans for their 44 campus buildings.
- Create a comprehensive wireless heatmap across all campuses: Once the management platform was up and running, we generated a usable heatmap of wireless activity across their multi-campus environment so they could identify dense spots, coverage gaps, and other holes in their wireless network.
- Remedy coverage gaps and refresh wireless infrastructure: Using the heatmaps, we provided a recommendation on where additional APs were needed to address coverage gaps, and worked with them to refresh their wireless hardware to new Aruba appliances across all campuses.
The results and ultimate benefits
Before working with us, Delgado’s investment in AirWave was providing little value as they were trying to manage their wireless infrastructure with disparate systems. The single instance of AirWave that we rolled out has consolidated management, simplified network monitoring, improved network visibility, and prepared their school for future growth and innovation. This deployment also made it possible for us to create usable heatmaps that enabled us to successfully address the wireless coverage gaps they had across their campuses. Delgado was so pleased with our work that they also plan on hiring us for another professional services engagement to update their network authentication technology, currently provided by Aruba ClearPass.
IT benefits:
• Consolidation of wireless management under one platform
• Usable heatmaps for all of their campuses
• Simplified network monitoring and improved visibility
• Modern network that supports growth and innovation
Student and staff benefits:
• Fast, reliable wireless access anywhere on campus
• Ability to securely connect to school resources on any device
• Faster resolution of wireless issues with IT support
Contact us to learn how you can benefit from aruba technology and ltg’s professional services
