Bandwidth 101: The Battle to Meet Rising Student Demand

If you think the problems of BYOD are tough for business, consider what’s going on at colleges, where IT staff are just starting to mobilize for the onslaught of returning students and all their smartphones, tablets, iPods, wireless printers, games, Webcams, e-readers, and streaming video apps like Skype and Netflix.

I mention this because I am acutely aware of the problem as the parent of a college sophomore encumbered with much, if not all, of the above-mentioned gear. But I am also raising a red flag about how network management in the workplace is going to become that much more complicated with the arrival of Generation-Next. (I’m sure someone has already coined a catchy name for them; if you know it, please share.)

It’s not hard to find evidence that colleges and universities are trying to stay ahead of the mobility curve. Case studies abound on the Internet, with upbeat headlines such as "Broadband, High-Speed Fiber Networking Infrastructure: A Community College Vision" and "College Campuses Embrace Mobility."

I found a more realistic picture -- literally -- of what's in store in an infographic titled "The Battle for Bandwidth" from news and information portal OnlineColleges.net. When 76 percent of college IT departments describe bandwidth demands as a "significant issue," and 77 percent say the increasing number of student mobile devices is having a "significant impact" on infrastructure -- well, that’s definitely a battle, and an uphill one at that.

The infographic culled data from several sources: ACUTA, the Association for Information Communications Technology Professionals in Higher Education; eCampusNews; and MultiFamilyExecutive.com. Among the trends compiled in the graphic were:

• Mobility is front and center. College and university tech departments are charged with developing mobile apps for everything from checking grades and registering for classes to accessing course material and communicating with professors and classmates. Some colleges are investing in IP video where instructors record lectures and post them privately for students to view at their convenience.


• Tablet use will grow the fastest. Approximately 40 percent of students on the typical college campus today have three or more devices connected to the school’s network at any given time. Tablets and smartphones consume most of the bandwidth. But 90 percent of colleges predict that tablets will be the devices that devour the most bandwidth within a few years.


• IT staff are stretched thin. The principle headaches are keeping up with networking trends, paying for network infrastructure improvements on a fixed budget, student and staff support, managing campus IP addresses, and maintaining security in a free-wheeling college environment.


• Residential bandwidth is a money pit. Half of IT departments pay for bandwidth supplied to the college residential networks, but they don’t recover the cost. The majority of colleges spend 20 percent of their annual IT budgets on residential IT networking.