Written by Allison Hudgins ~ Assistant Editor
Photo of Drysdale Student Center taken by Allison Hudgins
From the beginning of the spring semester students and faculty at the University of Lynchburg have been experiencing unreliable internet connectivity across campus.
Several students report being kicked off the internet in the middle of classes and/or while doing schoolwork and other activities that require internet access, hindering the productivity and stability of the university’s network infrastructure.
Perhaps the most frustrating thing that students face when being on campus is when they get kicked the WiFi and it will not reconnect.
Ava Mann, junior, has experienced this issue saying, “The Wi-Fi takes forever to load. Sometimes you will get an error message that tells you this doesn’t load. Other times it connected to the Wi-Fi but I would not get internet.”
While the connectivity problems have impacted the entire university community, students noticed that it is worse in certain areas.
Erik Rosine, sophomore, is one of these students who has seen the difference.
“In Drysdale, I notice that is where the Wi-Fi connection is bad. It makes sense given the amount of people here. It is also bad in Schewel and Hobbs, “ said Rosine.
Adding to the frustration, the Wi-Fi problems appear to fluctuate based on the time of day, with peak usage hours in the evening and weekend resulting in an even less reliable connection.
Sophomore, Maya Taylor says, “The connection is slow during the day when I’m in classes. It gets worse as the day goes by into the night. Once it’s late in the day, it’s very hard to keep a stable internet connection,” said Taylor.
The university has been working to identify the root of the connectivity issues and implement solutions.
They have noticed there has been some improvement to the Wi-Fi issues, however, not as much as they hoped it to be.
After they finished their investigation with their Internet service provider (ISP) they determined the cause.
Bryson Childress, ITR help desk manager, explains that “the ISP’s internet pipes to campus were being overloaded at peak usage times as more and more devices were being added to the network. We are currently working with our ISP to double the size of those pipes by increasing the bandwidth cap for the University.”
Some suggestions to work the Wi-Fi issues include using the ethernet ports that can be located in your dorm room.
To turn on the ethernet port you will need to contact the ITR Help Desk.
Another option is to use the Wi-Fi in the morning or download the material you can to work on them.
Additional questions can be directed towards the ITR help desk.
