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CASE STUDY
CAMPBELL COUNTY SCHOOL DISTRICT, GILLETTE, WYOMING
WIRELESS LAN (WLAN)

A WYOMING SCHOOL
DISTRICT DOES THE MATH
ON WIRELESS TESTING
	 CUSTOMER PROFILE
	 Campbell County
School District 	
•	 K-12
•	 Schools: 15 elementary,
5 secondary, 1 virtual
•	 8,500 students
•	 Over 600 faculty

“	The Motorola wireless network enables us to give our students the most
advanced learning environment possible. It lets us administer our
state-mandated tests in a stress-free environment because our students
have reliable connectivity to the proficiency exams.”
-	 Lyla Downey, Assistant Superintendent of Technology, Campbell County School District

SITUATION
Need for Reliable Connectivity to Support
Education and Testing
Located in central Wyoming, Campbell County is a 5,000
square mile, mostly rural area with a rapidly growing
population of 39,000. It has been listed as one of the top
100 places to live in rural America, and one of the County’s
biggest attractions is the high quality of its schools.
A few years ago, school officials realized that they
needed more connectivity to support interactive educational
efforts and to conduct state-mandated testing such as
the Proficiency Assessments for Wyoming Students
(PAWS) online.

SOLUTION
High-Speed Motorola Wireless WLAN
After trying two different wireless solutions — and
being disappointed in the reliability of one system and in
the cost of the other — Campbell County School District
officials decided to install a Motorola wireless local area
network (WLAN).

RESULT
Reliable Wireless Coverage at Half the Cost
Campbell County receives reliable wireless coverage for
half the cost of alternative wireless LAN networks. “The
Motorola product line is much more cost-effective than
the other solution we had,” says Downey. “You can almost
equip two schools for the cost of one.”
And the reliability? The IT staff is no longer constantly
traveling to the various schools to troubleshoot the network
because the number of maintenance calls has dropped
significantly.

	 Motorola Solution
•	 Motorola 802.11g WLAN
for first phase and 802.11n
for second phase
•	 AP300 and AP650
access points
•	 RFS4000, RFS6000
and RFS7000 wireless
switches/controllers
•	 Motorola LANPlanner software
•	 Motorola PTP 600 and PTP 800
wireless Ethernet bridges
	 Benefits	
•	 Unmatched reliability
•	 Lower total cost of ownership
•	 Easy maintenance and
installation
CASE STUDY
CAMPBELL COUNTY SCHOOL DISTRICT, GILLETTE, WYOMING
WIRELESS LAN (WLAN)

GOING BEYOND WIRES
Campbell County School District relies heavily on technology
to teach and evaluate its students. For instance, “as part of
the curriculum, students have to create a podcast on a
particular topic,” Downey says. “They research a topic, and
they write on it. They have to demonstrate that they can
bring in hypertext and music and sound. But the project also
has to meet the standards for a particular subject area,
like science and social studies.”

While the proficiency exams were being administered,
the off-the-shelf wireless routers would lock up without
warning and students would randomly lose connectivity.
School officials knew this could quickly impact the school’s
reputation and its operations.

“These are long assessments, and we didn’t have enough
wired computers to support them,” says Downey. Early on,
Campbell County School District officials realized that putting
more wires into each classroom to support the schools’
educational programs and its testing efforts would be too
costly. So Campbell County began looking at implementing
wireless connectivity.

A few months later, as Campbell County got ready to install
wireless networks in its other schools, school district officials
reached out to their wireless communications provider.

“The PAWS testing is high stakes,” says Downey. “If students
don’t do well, they’re classified as failing progress. And if
they don’t make progress for three years in a row, the
For many years, the District had supported wired connectivity principal can be fired. After five years, teachers can be fired.”
in many of its schools, and this allowed students to complete
Losing wireless connectivity in the middle of testing was
many of the required interactive technology projects. But a
few years ago, Campbell County School District realized that not acceptable, and Campbell County started looking for
it needed additional connectivity to support its administration new wireless equipment. This time, instead of using offof the standardized tests mandated by the state of Wyoming, the-shelf equipment, the County went with a more robust
technology and installed it in three locations. The solution
called PAWS, or Proficiency Assessments for Wyoming
worked, but it was very expensive.
Students.

WHY OFF-THE-SHELF WAS JUST
NOT GOOD ENOUGH
Campbell County School District first tried an off-the-shelf
WiFi solution. But they immediately began experiencing
problems, and District officials quickly realized that not all
wireless LAN solutions are the same.

The company was so convinced that Campbell County would
be thrilled with both the reliability and the cost-effectiveness
of Motorola’s wireless LAN solution that it offered to install
a Motorola WLAN network at no cost in one of Campbell
County’s older elementary schools.
The result? Campbell County School District purchased the
Motorola WiFi equipment long before the demonstration
ended. That’s how well they liked it.

“	The Motorola product
line is much more costeffective than the other
solution we had. You can
almost equip two schools
	 for the cost of one.”
	 Lyla Downey
	 Assistant Superintendant
of Technology, Campbell County
School District
CASE STUDY
CAMPBELL COUNTY SCHOOL DISTRICT, GILLETTE, WYOMING
WIRELESS LAN (WLAN)

“	Being able to plug in the
building plan and decide
how many access ports
you have is a big deal. It
	 saved us time and money.”
	 Larry Ferrell
	 Network Engineer,
	 Campbell County School District

Initially, five schools were equipped with Motorola 802.11g
wireless LAN. With continued great results, the remaining
15 schools in the district were equipped with the latest
802.11n wireless LAN from Motorola.
Once WLAN was installed at three of the more remote
schools it was evident that more bandwidth was needed.
Fiber was not an option and the existing T1 lines were not
robust enough to handle the schools’ increasing bandwidth
needs. Motorola’s PTP 600 and PTP 800 wireless Ethernet
bridges were installed and the schools now have more than
enough capacity with high reliability and throughput.
Campbell County plans to install Motorola wireless LAN
equipment in each one of its existing schools in the next few
years and will pay for these installations through national
and state grants. In addition, Campbell County School District
plans to build more than six new schools in the next six years
and will install Motorola solutions in those schools as they
are being constructed.

SYSTEM MAINTENANCE IS A BREEZE
The number of calls that Campbell County School District
receives from the schools has decreased to almost nothing.
“I haven’t had a single access port go down on me yet,” says
Larry Ferrell, network engineer at Campbell County School
District. “And I have rarely had to reboot the controller.”
The network has worked flawlessly even with hundreds of
devices all working at the same time.
Managing the system once it is in place is just as easy.
Ferrell can easily view the status of the access ports at all
the schools and manage them by logging onto the network in
his office. If changes need to be made to the system, Ferrell
simply reprograms the wireless switch/controller instead of
having to retrofit every access port.

In addition, the wireless switch dynamically manages the
network in real-time. “The switch actually controls all the
access ports, and if one access port is too busy, it will
hand off to another one,” says Ferrell. “So the bandwidth
is shared by the access ports in the building.”

QUICK AND EASY INSTALLATION
Ferrell was also amazed at how easily the Motorola
equipment could be installed. Motorola’s wireless LAN
design software, called LANPlanner, enabled the
communications partner and Campbell County to easily
map out the ideal location of the network’s access ports
using a digital computer-aided design (CAD) file of each
school building.
“We wanted to maximize the wireless network to
support the full 54 megabits per second possible,” says the
communications partner. “With Motorola’s LANPlanner,
there’s no guesswork involved. This makes it very efficient
for the customer. They don’t install any more access ports
than they need.”
Based on the work with the LANPlanner, a large number of
access ports were installed in the junior high building where
the classroom walls were made of brick. In schools where
classrooms were drywalled, the LANPlanner showed that
fewer access ports were needed.
LANPlanner also enabled the communications partner
to view coverage between floors where, for example,
an access port on the third floor might support connectivity on the second floor — and adjust the network layout
accordingly.
“Being able to plug in the building plan and decide how
many access ports you have is a big deal,” says Ferrell.
“It saved us time and money.”
CASE STUDY
CAMPBELL COUNTY SCHOOL DISTRICT, GILLETTE, WYOMING
WIRELESS LAN (WLAN)

Once it was determined where the access ports would go,
installing them was incredibly easy. “They mount in the
ceiling tiles. They have a clear clip that lets you put two
small holes in the ceiling tile and snap in the access port,”
says the communications provider. “After it’s installed, you
see two flashing lights on the ceiling so you can tell the
status of the signal just by looking at it.”

wireless connectivity. These StarBoards can be used to
display interactive worksheets, show DVDs or to display
information from a computer screen to the whole class.
For instance, teachers can use mapping software to locate
where newsworthy events around the globe occurred that
day and show that location to students using the StarBoards
in just seconds.

EDUCATION BECOMES MUCH
MORE INTERACTIVE

In addition, Campbell County created a server where
students can collaborate by sharing ideas and folders —
Perhaps the greatest benefit of having reliable, cost-effective
and with the more reliable connection, students now have
wireless connectivity in the classroom is the educational
no problem connecting to that server.
benefits it provides.
“The Motorola wireless network enables us to give our
students the most advanced learning environment possible,”
says Downey.
The wireless LAN has even allowed Campbell County to
incorporate technology even more fully into its teaching
to create a more interesting, interactive experience for
students.
Campbell County makes extensive use of iPODs and
iPADS in the classroom for differentiated instruction and
enrichment in reading, writing and mathematics. Exciting
new applications, which include movies and multimedia, are
being downloaded regularly and are enhancing the overall
learning experience for students. Already, math scores have
begun to show improvement and have increased greatly
over levels seen just two years ago.
In its newest school, Campbell County installed the latest
smart board technology called “StarBoards,” which allow
teachers to maximize their interaction with students via

“The server makes it easier for students to interact with
each other and with teachers — and with parents to interact
with teachers,” says Ferrell. “It’s like Facebook or Twitter
but limited to those in our school district. Students can post
ideas and safely talk on there.”
The bottom line is that thanks to Motorola’s wireless LAN
solution, Campbell County can now deliver a cutting-edge
technological education to students — without breaking
the bank.
According to the communications provider, “We’ve been
doing WiFi as a company for five years, and the Motorola
wireless LAN product is one of the best products I’ve ever
seen. I’ve installed other products, and they haven’t been
as good. We’ve also seen others put in alternative solutions,
and they just experience trouble from day one. When we
replace an existing system with any of Motorola’s wireless
solutions, we tell our customers: ‘You will not have any
more trouble with your network.’ And they don’t. The
Motorola equipment just works.”

MAKING SCHOOLS
SAFER WITH BETTER
COMMUNICATIONS
Motorola and their local
communications provider have
been involved with many projects
for Wyoming and Campbell
County. Recently, Campbell County
School District installed Motorola
two-way radios on 169 school
buses as part of the state’s
WyoLink communications initative.
WyoLink is a statewide digital
trunked VHF P25 compliant public
safety communications system
designed to coordinate and
integrate communications
between state, local and federal
public safety agencies.

Motorola, Inc. 1301 E. Algonquin Road, Schaumburg, Illinois 60196 U.S.A. www.motorola.com
MOTOROLA, MOTOROLA SOLUTIONS and the Stylized M Logo are trademarks or registered trademarks of Motorola Trademark Holdings, LLC and are used under license.
All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners. © 2011 Motorola, Inc. All rights reserved.

RO-29-100A

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Campbell county case_study

  • 1. CASE STUDY CAMPBELL COUNTY SCHOOL DISTRICT, GILLETTE, WYOMING WIRELESS LAN (WLAN) A WYOMING SCHOOL DISTRICT DOES THE MATH ON WIRELESS TESTING CUSTOMER PROFILE Campbell County School District • K-12 • Schools: 15 elementary, 5 secondary, 1 virtual • 8,500 students • Over 600 faculty “ The Motorola wireless network enables us to give our students the most advanced learning environment possible. It lets us administer our state-mandated tests in a stress-free environment because our students have reliable connectivity to the proficiency exams.” - Lyla Downey, Assistant Superintendent of Technology, Campbell County School District SITUATION Need for Reliable Connectivity to Support Education and Testing Located in central Wyoming, Campbell County is a 5,000 square mile, mostly rural area with a rapidly growing population of 39,000. It has been listed as one of the top 100 places to live in rural America, and one of the County’s biggest attractions is the high quality of its schools. A few years ago, school officials realized that they needed more connectivity to support interactive educational efforts and to conduct state-mandated testing such as the Proficiency Assessments for Wyoming Students (PAWS) online. SOLUTION High-Speed Motorola Wireless WLAN After trying two different wireless solutions — and being disappointed in the reliability of one system and in the cost of the other — Campbell County School District officials decided to install a Motorola wireless local area network (WLAN). RESULT Reliable Wireless Coverage at Half the Cost Campbell County receives reliable wireless coverage for half the cost of alternative wireless LAN networks. “The Motorola product line is much more cost-effective than the other solution we had,” says Downey. “You can almost equip two schools for the cost of one.” And the reliability? The IT staff is no longer constantly traveling to the various schools to troubleshoot the network because the number of maintenance calls has dropped significantly. Motorola Solution • Motorola 802.11g WLAN for first phase and 802.11n for second phase • AP300 and AP650 access points • RFS4000, RFS6000 and RFS7000 wireless switches/controllers • Motorola LANPlanner software • Motorola PTP 600 and PTP 800 wireless Ethernet bridges Benefits • Unmatched reliability • Lower total cost of ownership • Easy maintenance and installation
  • 2. CASE STUDY CAMPBELL COUNTY SCHOOL DISTRICT, GILLETTE, WYOMING WIRELESS LAN (WLAN) GOING BEYOND WIRES Campbell County School District relies heavily on technology to teach and evaluate its students. For instance, “as part of the curriculum, students have to create a podcast on a particular topic,” Downey says. “They research a topic, and they write on it. They have to demonstrate that they can bring in hypertext and music and sound. But the project also has to meet the standards for a particular subject area, like science and social studies.” While the proficiency exams were being administered, the off-the-shelf wireless routers would lock up without warning and students would randomly lose connectivity. School officials knew this could quickly impact the school’s reputation and its operations. “These are long assessments, and we didn’t have enough wired computers to support them,” says Downey. Early on, Campbell County School District officials realized that putting more wires into each classroom to support the schools’ educational programs and its testing efforts would be too costly. So Campbell County began looking at implementing wireless connectivity. A few months later, as Campbell County got ready to install wireless networks in its other schools, school district officials reached out to their wireless communications provider. “The PAWS testing is high stakes,” says Downey. “If students don’t do well, they’re classified as failing progress. And if they don’t make progress for three years in a row, the For many years, the District had supported wired connectivity principal can be fired. After five years, teachers can be fired.” in many of its schools, and this allowed students to complete Losing wireless connectivity in the middle of testing was many of the required interactive technology projects. But a few years ago, Campbell County School District realized that not acceptable, and Campbell County started looking for it needed additional connectivity to support its administration new wireless equipment. This time, instead of using offof the standardized tests mandated by the state of Wyoming, the-shelf equipment, the County went with a more robust technology and installed it in three locations. The solution called PAWS, or Proficiency Assessments for Wyoming worked, but it was very expensive. Students. WHY OFF-THE-SHELF WAS JUST NOT GOOD ENOUGH Campbell County School District first tried an off-the-shelf WiFi solution. But they immediately began experiencing problems, and District officials quickly realized that not all wireless LAN solutions are the same. The company was so convinced that Campbell County would be thrilled with both the reliability and the cost-effectiveness of Motorola’s wireless LAN solution that it offered to install a Motorola WLAN network at no cost in one of Campbell County’s older elementary schools. The result? Campbell County School District purchased the Motorola WiFi equipment long before the demonstration ended. That’s how well they liked it. “ The Motorola product line is much more costeffective than the other solution we had. You can almost equip two schools for the cost of one.” Lyla Downey Assistant Superintendant of Technology, Campbell County School District
  • 3. CASE STUDY CAMPBELL COUNTY SCHOOL DISTRICT, GILLETTE, WYOMING WIRELESS LAN (WLAN) “ Being able to plug in the building plan and decide how many access ports you have is a big deal. It saved us time and money.” Larry Ferrell Network Engineer, Campbell County School District Initially, five schools were equipped with Motorola 802.11g wireless LAN. With continued great results, the remaining 15 schools in the district were equipped with the latest 802.11n wireless LAN from Motorola. Once WLAN was installed at three of the more remote schools it was evident that more bandwidth was needed. Fiber was not an option and the existing T1 lines were not robust enough to handle the schools’ increasing bandwidth needs. Motorola’s PTP 600 and PTP 800 wireless Ethernet bridges were installed and the schools now have more than enough capacity with high reliability and throughput. Campbell County plans to install Motorola wireless LAN equipment in each one of its existing schools in the next few years and will pay for these installations through national and state grants. In addition, Campbell County School District plans to build more than six new schools in the next six years and will install Motorola solutions in those schools as they are being constructed. SYSTEM MAINTENANCE IS A BREEZE The number of calls that Campbell County School District receives from the schools has decreased to almost nothing. “I haven’t had a single access port go down on me yet,” says Larry Ferrell, network engineer at Campbell County School District. “And I have rarely had to reboot the controller.” The network has worked flawlessly even with hundreds of devices all working at the same time. Managing the system once it is in place is just as easy. Ferrell can easily view the status of the access ports at all the schools and manage them by logging onto the network in his office. If changes need to be made to the system, Ferrell simply reprograms the wireless switch/controller instead of having to retrofit every access port. In addition, the wireless switch dynamically manages the network in real-time. “The switch actually controls all the access ports, and if one access port is too busy, it will hand off to another one,” says Ferrell. “So the bandwidth is shared by the access ports in the building.” QUICK AND EASY INSTALLATION Ferrell was also amazed at how easily the Motorola equipment could be installed. Motorola’s wireless LAN design software, called LANPlanner, enabled the communications partner and Campbell County to easily map out the ideal location of the network’s access ports using a digital computer-aided design (CAD) file of each school building. “We wanted to maximize the wireless network to support the full 54 megabits per second possible,” says the communications partner. “With Motorola’s LANPlanner, there’s no guesswork involved. This makes it very efficient for the customer. They don’t install any more access ports than they need.” Based on the work with the LANPlanner, a large number of access ports were installed in the junior high building where the classroom walls were made of brick. In schools where classrooms were drywalled, the LANPlanner showed that fewer access ports were needed. LANPlanner also enabled the communications partner to view coverage between floors where, for example, an access port on the third floor might support connectivity on the second floor — and adjust the network layout accordingly. “Being able to plug in the building plan and decide how many access ports you have is a big deal,” says Ferrell. “It saved us time and money.”
  • 4. CASE STUDY CAMPBELL COUNTY SCHOOL DISTRICT, GILLETTE, WYOMING WIRELESS LAN (WLAN) Once it was determined where the access ports would go, installing them was incredibly easy. “They mount in the ceiling tiles. They have a clear clip that lets you put two small holes in the ceiling tile and snap in the access port,” says the communications provider. “After it’s installed, you see two flashing lights on the ceiling so you can tell the status of the signal just by looking at it.” wireless connectivity. These StarBoards can be used to display interactive worksheets, show DVDs or to display information from a computer screen to the whole class. For instance, teachers can use mapping software to locate where newsworthy events around the globe occurred that day and show that location to students using the StarBoards in just seconds. EDUCATION BECOMES MUCH MORE INTERACTIVE In addition, Campbell County created a server where students can collaborate by sharing ideas and folders — Perhaps the greatest benefit of having reliable, cost-effective and with the more reliable connection, students now have wireless connectivity in the classroom is the educational no problem connecting to that server. benefits it provides. “The Motorola wireless network enables us to give our students the most advanced learning environment possible,” says Downey. The wireless LAN has even allowed Campbell County to incorporate technology even more fully into its teaching to create a more interesting, interactive experience for students. Campbell County makes extensive use of iPODs and iPADS in the classroom for differentiated instruction and enrichment in reading, writing and mathematics. Exciting new applications, which include movies and multimedia, are being downloaded regularly and are enhancing the overall learning experience for students. Already, math scores have begun to show improvement and have increased greatly over levels seen just two years ago. In its newest school, Campbell County installed the latest smart board technology called “StarBoards,” which allow teachers to maximize their interaction with students via “The server makes it easier for students to interact with each other and with teachers — and with parents to interact with teachers,” says Ferrell. “It’s like Facebook or Twitter but limited to those in our school district. Students can post ideas and safely talk on there.” The bottom line is that thanks to Motorola’s wireless LAN solution, Campbell County can now deliver a cutting-edge technological education to students — without breaking the bank. According to the communications provider, “We’ve been doing WiFi as a company for five years, and the Motorola wireless LAN product is one of the best products I’ve ever seen. I’ve installed other products, and they haven’t been as good. We’ve also seen others put in alternative solutions, and they just experience trouble from day one. When we replace an existing system with any of Motorola’s wireless solutions, we tell our customers: ‘You will not have any more trouble with your network.’ And they don’t. The Motorola equipment just works.” MAKING SCHOOLS SAFER WITH BETTER COMMUNICATIONS Motorola and their local communications provider have been involved with many projects for Wyoming and Campbell County. Recently, Campbell County School District installed Motorola two-way radios on 169 school buses as part of the state’s WyoLink communications initative. WyoLink is a statewide digital trunked VHF P25 compliant public safety communications system designed to coordinate and integrate communications between state, local and federal public safety agencies. Motorola, Inc. 1301 E. Algonquin Road, Schaumburg, Illinois 60196 U.S.A. www.motorola.com MOTOROLA, MOTOROLA SOLUTIONS and the Stylized M Logo are trademarks or registered trademarks of Motorola Trademark Holdings, LLC and are used under license. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners. © 2011 Motorola, Inc. All rights reserved. RO-29-100A