Customer Success Story
School District Boosts Learning Environment with AI-Driven WLAN
Wireless networking is key to the learning process at North Canton City Schools (NCCS), a K-12 school district in Ohio serving over 4400 students and 650 staff. It enables easy access to web-hosted learning materials, lets students communicate while on the move, and is critical for online testing and boosting learning outcomes.
Overview
| Company | North Canton City Schools |
| Industry | Education |
| Products used | Wireless (Wi-Fi) Assurance, AP41 |
| Region | Americas |
4,400+
Students
650+
Administrative Staff
Recently, the number of connected devices across the school district began to grow exponentially thanks to a 1:1 computing initiative that required the deployment of over 5000 Chromebooks, coupled with a BYOD policy that allowed high school students to bring their own computers, tablets and smart phones. Unfortunately, NCCS’ existing wireless network, provided by Cisco Meraki, could not keep up. Like many school districts, NCCS had a challenge supporting a high density of devices in a consistent and reliable manner, and they had limited IT staff to spend time troubleshooting issues as they arose.
“Students were dissatisfied they couldn’t use personal devices and faculty were frustrated with poor Wi-Fi,” said John Fano, System Admin at NCCS. “The IT team was annoyed because we could not troubleshoot problems quickly and cost effectively. It was clear that we outgrew our WLAN and were in need of an upgrade.”
The NCCS IT staff, in conjunction with their trusted partner Technology Engineering Group, explored alternative WLAN options. Ultimately, they chose the Mist Learning WLAN and deployed over 300 Mist AP41 Access Points, in conjunction with Mist’s Wi-Fi Assurance cloud service.
Mist is the first vendor in the industry to use AI to simplify Wi-Fi operations and troubleshooting through automation and insight.
Unique capabilities of the Mist platform include high density performance, visibility into the user experience, single-click root cause identification, dynamic packet capture (dPCAP), and simplified policy enforcement.
With the Mist Learning WLAN in place, NCCS has successfully deployed Chromebooks for their 1:1 initiative and has been able to allow a BYOD policy for their students. They also have confidence that the wireless network can seamlessly support key online applications, such as Schoology LMS, eSchoolPLUS SIS and LanSchool.
In addition, as part of Hoover High School’s Video Productions and Broadcast Journalism program, NCCS has an educational television station, ncTV. To give students a real-world experience with live event production, the school has a “Mobile Storyteller” production studio on wheels. The school deployed the Mist Learning WLAN in the vehicle to foster collaboration and rapid production while they are working on large media files that require gigabit Wi-Fi. By leveraging the Mist solution, the IT team has been able to keep the network up and running with remote troubleshooting that eliminated the need to send engineers out in the field if a problem were to arise.
North Canton City Schools is now prepared for the future as more devices enter the campus and educational tools continue to evolve, helping to accelerate learning for the next generation of innovators.
The Products
Mist AI uses a combination of Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning and data science techniques to optimize user experiences and simplify operations across the wireless access, wired access, and SD-WAN domains.
Wireless (Wi-Fi) Assurance
Driven by Mist AI and machine learning, the Juniper Mist Wireless Assurance cloud service automates troubleshooting and operations, making wireless networks predictable, reliable, and measurable while providing near-real-time visibility into user service levels.
AP41
The Juniper AP41 series are high-performance 802.11ac Wave 2 access points with integrated patented virtual Bluetooth® LE and Internet of Things (IoT).
Published November 2018