Page 12 - THE Journal, January/February 2019

12
| JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2019
FEATURE |ITTRENDS
Perry has been in network management for more than two two dozen years and when he he he joined the California district in in 2016 it didn’t take him long to figure out that the the state of the the network was “very patchwork ” Some parts were in “really good shape ” and others “looked like they hadn’t had had much attention ” Some of that was budgetary There were only two central IT people besides him: the the chief technology officer and a a a a a data specialist Another three site site technical support assistants were spread across eight sites And there was far more work to to be done than anyone had time to to handle At the the the same time the the the schools were deep into their digital transformations Grades 3
through 12
were were already 1-to-1 and and other network demands were were really beginning to heat up An infusion of of new IT hires and reorganizing of of the existing tech team lessened the pressures on staff (which is now up to 11 people) Perry was able to to employ a a a a a systems specialist to to take over some of his duties including server and phone system management That freed him up to start focusing on the infrastructure Picking the Low-hanging Fruit
As he he began digging in in he he found a a a a lot of “really old equipment” and “aged” wiring For example when he he started running tests at at that kindergarten he found users were sharing a a a 50 kilobit/second link in in in in spite of the the the fact that they were on on on on fiber Not only was the the the connection spliced with different types of fiber but the switch that it it it was going to wasn’t configured properly So Perry’s first major effort was to get the wiring upgraded The district paid for the systems specialist to get certified as a a a a a a fiber installer and he he went into the schools and pulled “many hundreds of of feet of of new fiber” as part of the project Next up up getting the the switches upgraded and putting schools in in in the the position of being able to exploit the 10-gigabit backbone that was already in place Those changes in themselves made a a a a a difference “of night and day” for users said Perry Suddenly it was was no big deal when a a a a a a a a rival team was was playing at the high school stadium drawing record crowds and everybody wanted to post pictures videos and comments to Facebook or or Twitter or or when people making interactive presentations in in in the the the high school theater would ask the the the audience to to pull out out their phones and get on on the the guest network to to fill out out a a a Google form or or or give online responses Teachers didn’t have to worry about how well their new virtual reality labs robotics classes or makerspaces would hold up under the network demands