@ ACUTA: University deploys WiMAX system for students

PHOENIX – Up in the northernmost corner of Michigan is a group of IT executives who built a WiMAX network for their university and seemed to have a blast doing it.
Northern Michigan University sits in Marquette, Mich., population about 22,000.It’s a rural community with a lot of blue-collar workers in the mining and logging industry, as well as tourism, said NMU’s Gavin Leach. The university counts about 9,500 students, 35% of which qualify for Pell Grants, and about 6,000 of which live off campus. Most of the students can’t afford broadband access at apartments where they only live nine months of the year, so students had to drive back to campus to get Internet access or meet at a local coffee shop to collaborate with fellow students on group projects. (So much for being able to do their homework at home.) The NMU presentation was offered during the ACUTA (the association for information communications technology professionals in higher education) winter conference held here earlier this week.
As a way to lure students to the four-year college, NMU includes a new laptop for students as part of its tuition. This year, the new laptops also had WiMAX access embedded in them, along with traditional Wi-Fi. The university met with the Federal Communications Commission to get permission to operate the network using EBS spectrum to use for education purposes. (The university had built a large Wi-Fi network but there were coverage holes and a mesh networks didn’t prove cost-effective.)
Installing the WiMAX network had its challenges, including putting an access point on top of a small, round water tower that barely held room for one more piece of equipment. (A security rail was installed.) Another water tower proved a challenge because the stairway inside was too small to accommodate the equipment, so the radio was wrapped in a towel and lugged up the side of the tower.
“WiMAX is alive and well everywhere outside the U.S.,” said David Maki. Nevertheless, the company can switch to TD-LTE equipment later if it chooses to.
The university is using Motorola Mobility equipment, but said it only bought the radio and the gateway solution from the company, using a lot of free monitoring software and such, noted NMU’s John Marra.
The in-building penetration is good, Maki said, adding that coverage is decent even inside the pool area at the Ramada Inn, a hotel built with a lot of concrete. Nevertheless, “we wouldn’t recommend it as a replacement to Wi-Fi.” Maki said students should plug into a wired broadband connection first if possible, then try the Wi-Fi network and after that, connect using the WiMAX network.
The university also is using the WiMAX network to facilitate distance learning. There are about 100 students in the Big Bay area who literally have to go about 100 miles to reach the nearest school. The university built a tower on an island, using the lighthouse to house the tower, which can then reach the Big Bay area. Interestingly, the tower on the island uses solar, wind and propane for its generator system. While northern Michigan sports some harsh elements, especially in winter, the IT execs have found heavy fog to be the biggest issue with coverage, not heavy snow.