Tips for using wireless in the classroom at IU

Note:
eduroam is replacing IU Secure as the default wireless network for students, faculty, staff, and affiliates on all IU campuses. As of May 26, 2021, IU Secure is no longer available in the residence halls, and will fully retire in the near future. All new wireless connections should use eduroam; see Connect to eduroam.

Although wireless coverage is widely available on all campuses, large numbers of people using the same wireless network in the same area at the same time can result in a poor experience. The following tips will maximize your potential for success.

  • Contact UITS regarding the wireless capacity of your classroom. If you plan on your students using wireless in the classroom, contact UITS with the classroom location and class size. UITS should be able to make a preliminary assessment of the number of Wi-Fi clients your classroom should reasonably support. Email Campus Network Engineering.
  • You can expect wireless service to be available for general use in the classroom. All classrooms should have coverage and capacity for general use in the classroom. This can be defined by utilizing wireless on occasion for lower bandwidth applications. If there is high-bandwidth usage by numerous devices simultaneously, wireless availability in classrooms cannot be guaranteed. if you are planning to use a bandwidth-intensive application, such as having your students utilize their devices to load images or to utilize a response-based application (for example, TopHat), you or your department IT Pro should contact UITS to do an assessment of your classroom prior to your class starting.
  • Turn off unnecessary Wi-Fi devices. Ask your students to turn off or put to sleep smartphones, iPods, and any other Wi-Fi-enabled devices that are not being used as part of the class. Devices left on may consume bandwidth and reduce service for the devices you want your students to use.
  • Encourage the use of 802.11ac (5 GHz) clients. The 802.11b/g/n client space is generally more congested and traditionally has more sources of interference than the 5 GHz space, so UITS encourages everyone to use clients that support 5 GHz 802.11ac. Many mobile clients, such as phones and tablets, support simultaneous dual band (2.4 GHz and 5 GHz). For example, the HP Slate 500 only supports 802.11n in 2.4 GHz, while the iPad 2 supports 802.11n 5 GHz operation. Both devices will work, but the iPad 2 will have a much better Wi-Fi experience using 5 GHz channels, while the HP Slate 500 will use the more congested 2.4 GHz channels.
  • Encourage students to update wireless drivers. The driver is the piece of software that controls the operation of the Wi-Fi radio on the client. Client issues are among the top reasons for wireless service problems, especially in large enterprise environments. You can often resolve issues with connectivity by upgrading to the latest version of the wireless driver on your device.

For help, contact your campus Support Center.

This is document bbba in the Knowledge Base.
Last modified on 2023-11-20 14:57:25.