While involved in online classroom activities, many students have encountered slow connections and blocked access due to ongoing connectivity issues affecting students and staff. IT supervisor Frank Ding explains that the main reason for this is the amount of students connected to one Wi-Fi box at a time.

“Oftentimes the teacher will say ‘everybody go watch this video.’ Guess what? Everyone is watching the same video at the same time killing the bandwidth for the classroom,” Ding said.

Ding further explains the types of Wi-Fi we have in the school. There are low density ones for classrooms that can hold up to 60 connections. Then there are high density devices for larger offices and areas such as the commons and gyms that hold up to 120 connections.

Ding and his team have discovered further problems involving the classrooms with windows looking into the learning commons on the third floor. They discovered that the low density and high density Wi-Fi do not coexist well together.

“If your device can pick up signals from both, it will try to go to the high density variation first. They are picking up signals from the commons in the high ceilings, which causes slowness in the classroom,” Ding said.

Senior Gabriella Metz has also experienced first hand the slow connection throughout the school. She has been quite frustrated with the Wi-Fi in her classrooms and feels it is affecting her learning.

“As a student it is really difficult because, say I’m in a class writing an essay, and it’s timed, if I can’t access those resources online because the internet is failing me, I fall behind,” Metz said.

Ding offers more insight about what to do as a quick fix to slow internet connection.

“We space them [Wi-Fi] out evenly in the commons, but students tend to jam into the middle of the commons, so my advice is go somewhere else, go to the corner of the commons,” Ding said.

For any issues or questions about your school issued devices internet connection visit the technology center located on the first floor by the library.