BRIDGES. COM in the right place at the right time !
More money being spent by schools to get on the net. This nr I found on the Wi-Lan thread illustrates how eager they are. Note the money they are spending and their statements about growing inet use in the schools.
( Not a plug for Wi-Lan)
For immediate release
Students surf for knowledge as Peel District School Board connects with
high-speed wireless Internet network from Wi-LAN
School system chooses faster, less expensive wireless networks as student
Internet use mushrooms
(Mississauga, Ontario, Canada, April 7, 1999) - Driven by surging Internet
use in its schools, the Peel District School Board today announced that it
will purchase 50 wireless Ethernet bridges from Wi-LAN Inc., a leading
provider of high-speed wireless data communication products. The units will
connect 28 secondary schools in the region. Peel District School Board is
one of Canada?s largest public school systems covering 776 square
kilometres in the municipalities of Missassauga, Brampton and Caledon - it
serves 104,000 students. The wireless wide area network will supply
students with the high-speed bandwidth needed to conduct research on the
Internet, as well as the ability to access centrally located on-line
archival databases containing encyclopedias, newspapers and magazines.
The Wi-LAN units will use a series of towers and antennas atop each school
to create a high-speed network backbone that transfers data via radio waves
rather than more expensive wire-based networks. Wi-LAN has begun shipping
the units for phase one of the project, scheduled to complete mid-summer.
In phase two, the board will evaluate upgrading the network backbone based
on demand and as newer, faster Wi-LAN units become available.
<"With the Internet flourishing in schools, the bandwidth demands on
existing systems has reached a critical point,"> says Michael Stratis,
Manager, PC LANs and Communication, Peel District School Board. "<<Wireless
was the only way we could feasibly provide the future bandwidth needed to
drive the next wave of education technology that increasingly relies on the
Internet.">>
<<Stratis says school boards across Canada are facing the same predicament as
they grapple with the need to implement capacity-intensive multimedia and
Internet applications under tight budgets. The Internet is in its infancy,
but increasingly provides the backbone for a range of innovative new
educational applications that are changing curriculum, as well as the
entire way information is gathered in schools, he says.>>
Searching for a low-cost alternative
Long renowned as a pioneer in the use of technology to support new
educational approaches, the Peel District School Board needed a faster,
less expensive means of connecting its schools.<< Driven by teachers using
the Internet in class and the need to position the schools for future
online applications, the demand curve on the board?s system was on a steady
rise with a typical school network supporting 150-450 computers and up to
2,200 students.>>
Stratis and his team recognized that the board?s existing ISDN network
didn?t have the capacity to support new educational Internet-based
curriculum such as distance and collaborative learning. They explored other
alternatives, such as, T1 service which would have raised the cost tenfold
to a staggering $20,000 per month for all secondary schools in the region.
As well, they wanted a technology that was not only the most cost-effective
option but also offered the flexibility to fit in with their existing
infrastructure.
Buoyed by a successful small-scale wireless project, the board decided to
pursue wireless as a final alternative. The search led them to Wi-LAN, who
installed 30-24 Hopper Plus Ethernet bridges between two schools north of
Brampton that had no access to digital lines. The board erected a 75-foot
tower on top of the central ?hub? at Robert J. Lee Public School that
enables students from the more distant Mayfield Public School to connect
wirelessly to the Internet. At two times the speed of T1 lines, the 3 Mbps
speed of the Wi-LAN bridges will also benefit teachers and administrators
who can now connect to host of new communication services as well as
future applications such as videoconferencing and distance learning.
"The low-cost of wireless was undoubtedly the major factor in our
decision," says Kevin Kelly, Communications and Internetworking Team Leader
for the Peel board. "And because there are no monthly charges with
wireless, we estimate the investment in phase one of the project will be
pay for itself in about 24 months."
The Peel board joins a growing list of schools that are using Wi-LAN
wireless technology to connect schools in both rural and remote school
districts. Wi-LAN?s high-speed wireless Ethernet bridges are currently used
by school districts in wireless Internet projects in Medicine Hat, Alberta,
as well as the recently announced Northern Lights School Division project
in northern Alberta that connects schools across more than 9,500 square
kilometres. Telecom giants in Sweden and the U.K. are also using Wi-LAN
technology to wirelessly connect outlying business districts in major
cities.
"Wireless technology is quickly gaining popularity with both the public and
private sector from cash-strapped school boards to multinational telecom
companies searching for new ways to extend services to a broader customer
base," says Dr. Hatim Zaghloul, Wi-LAN president and CEO.
About Wi-LAN
Wi-LAN delivers wireless data communications products that feature
consistent high performance, easy installation and superior quality at
significantly lower costs than traditional wire-based networking
alternatives. Wi-LAN provides infrastructure and high-speed networking
equipment for public and private wireless data networks.
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