West Ada School District

Overview

West Ada School District, located in Ada County, Idaho, prides itself in upholding its mission of "preparing today's students for tomorrow's challenges." One ever-present challenge-of today and tomorrow-for West Ada's IT department is enabling powerful learning experiences through reliable, secure technology and support.

The district's modern foundation of learning incorporates computing devices into almost all aspects of school day activities. From tablets in kindergarten classes to laptops in high schools, students depend on fast and secure wireless connectivity throughout the district's 58 campuses. In addition to having a one-to-one program that provides a device to each student and staff member, the district's network also supports staff and students using personal devices. A fiber-based WAN links the growing number of schools in the district to two on-premises data centers with gateways for access to software-as-a-service (SaaS)-based applications.

Maintaining West Ada School District as a thoroughly modern and connected computing environment is the responsibility of Keven Denton, deputy chief technology officer of the district, and his IT team of network architects, engineers, and technical support staff. The challenges of managing the district-wide network are threefold: maintaining reliable and fast Wi-Fi access for students and faculty throughout many buildings; updating the existing infrastructure to meet new requirements; and troubleshooting connections to outside resources that are beyond IT's direct control.

Transitioning to cloud management

The day-to-day management of the distributed network has traditionally been conducted through Cisco Prime Infrastructure and Cisco Catalyst 9800 Series Wireless Controllers. Meraki access points (APs) were first introduced in a pilot program to test compatibility and manageability in a hybrid Meraki access layer and Cisco Catalyst 9000 switching family core environment. When the Cisco Meraki dashboard with cloud management gained the ability to monitor Cisco Catalyst 9500 Series Switches and Catalyst 9100 Access Points, it provided West Ada's IT team with additional insights and control over the thousands of networking devices spread throughout the district.

"We were using all three management systems," states Denton. "We started with Cisco Prime [Infrastructure] many years ago and then transitioned to the first implementation of Cisco Catalyst Center when it was 1.0 and continued with all the iterations up through today, using it primarily to automate software image updates for the Catalyst switches. Now, with the recent introduction of the Meraki dashboard into our environment, we are starting to transition operations to the cloud, including monitoring of our Cisco Catalyst 9500 Series Switches."

"I think the biggest advantage to rolling out the Meraki dashboard, especially at our access layer, is that it lets us shift more easily from managing the deployment of each AP to an automation and orchestration stance, especially using templates for the access points," Denton explains. "The Meraki dashboard is just perfect for that level of management, and with the intuitive, cloud-based dashboard we can give a level of insight to our entire IT team. It saves us a lot of time."

For example, the Meraki dashboard shows each access point and exactly which switch port it is plugged into. It is easy to follow the topology from access points to the main office or data center. "That's extremely useful to me," Denton says, "because I can troubleshoot the network through the dashboard, our end-to-end visibility is increased."

West Ada Senior Network Engineer Eric Frost concurs with Denton. "The cloud monitoring capabilities in the Meraki dashboard are great. I particularly like the topology maps, where I can browse individual devices connecting to the network. I can troubleshoot with packet captures and reboot access points through the dashboard. While there are also a lot of great analytics in Cisco Prime [Infrastructure], they were not as nicely laid out as in the Meraki dashboard, which is more user-friendly. As soon as I started teaching the dashboard to my IT teams and our field techs, they really liked it. They quickly gravitated towards using it. The simplicity of use makes them much more efficient in resolving connection issues."

A busy (and quick) summer break to provision schools with Wi-Fi

As school sessions break for the summer, the IT team doubles down on its workload. Summer break is the ideal time to upgrade the network, fine-tune access point configurations, and connect new facilities. In 2021, the construction of a new high school in the district was just being completed in preparation for the new school year. It was time to wire the school with the latest Wi-Fi 6 APs and connect it to the WAN. The template-driven provisioning of the APs through the Meraki dashboard made the process simple and consistent, so all APs were configured identically.

Network Engineer Jared Desjarlais states: "Overall, I think template management is a big factor in the excellent usability of the Meraki dashboard. The templates are arranged so we can have a golden template for all the configurations we need. We want the RF to behave the same regardless of where an AP is located. Templates simplify how we manage thousands of APs, streamlining our provisioning process and lightening the summer workload."

Gaining visibility beyond the campus WAN

Using Cisco Meraki cloud management to configure and troubleshoot the majority of access points has given the West Ada IT team more visibility into the state of the wireless network. However, there is more to reliable connectivity than local Wi-Fi access. The dual-connected WAN that unites the schools also provides access to services and applications that all students and faculty need daily. Problems arise when there are issues beyond the IT team's control, such as a Microsoft 365 outage or a cut in the fiber caused by construction.

Desjarlais explains, "We are running ThousandEyes on [Cisco Catalyst 9300 Series] Switches at a handful of schools. ThousandEyes enables us to directly see WAN connectivity from these schools. That's helping us with troubleshooting, especially when SaaS services are unavailable. That's a big number one for us because we can say, hey, that's not our network. It's been very handy." The extended visibility provided by ThousandEyes enhances network assurance by enabling the IT team to quickly determine issues among the local network, provider networks, or the SaaS provider.

Let's talk 5G backup

Issues and disruptions to the network are bound to happen. For example, if construction crews accidentally cut into a fiber cable, and parts of the network are made unavailable, the front office is faced with challenges such as not being able to receive calls from parents throughout the day or manage bus coordination. To mitigate such challenges, the IT team plans to use Meraki MG cellular gateways to provide connectivity when normal operations are disrupted.

"Combined with a battery power supply, cellular gateways will be the core of an emergency network backup kit," Jared Desjarlais says. "Using the gateways should be fairly seamless since our laptops will still use the same wireless profile to connect to them. They have the appropriate ports so we can plug our Cisco phones directly into them, and they'll tunnel back so the front office can continue to operate and take parent phone calls in an emergency. The cellular gateways will perfectly fit our backup scenarios."

Networking the network

There is a tight-knit network of IT professionals among Idaho's school districts and universities. They gather regularly to exchange notes and experiences building and maintaining their technology platforms.

Deputy CTO Denton says, "We have an immense network of trusted colleagues throughout the Valley. When we get together, we discuss our new setup and how much we like it. They are eager to listen when we tell them we like something that is making our life more manageable and flexible. And we tell them a lot about Cisco and Meraki and our journey to the cloud."

The knowledge sharing goes beyond Idaho's school districts. Denton and his team work closely with the Cisco and Meraki support teams in making sure they are getting the most out of their solutions and which options are ideal for its educational budget. Denton describes the experience of working with Cisco by noting, "The technology is very important but it's the team of people who are there to help and support. Sales and sales engineering professionals from Cisco and Meraki play a pivotal role in the success of any solution. Their unwavering dedication to ensuring that customers can fully leverage Cisco and Meraki products is truly remarkable."

West Ada School District's journey from decentralized management to a cloud operating model has enabled the IT team to focus less on micromanaging issues as they occur and more on providing assurance that the network is meeting all the needs of students and faculty. Greater visibility from edge to core to devices from a central Meraki dashboard enables the team to be more proactive by identifying and fixing many types of issues before they impact the learning environment.