NEWS
Be sure to check out these other news stories:

Spring Fling goes Vegas
Bookstore committed to better service
SMP takes regional honors

 
 

GHC plans to extend wireless network

By Dustin Taylor
[email protected]
Staff Writer

Joseph Bullard, computer science major from Cedar Bluff, Ala., works on his laptop in the student center. A young man rushes into the student center of Georgia Highlands College�s Floyd campus and huddles against the window, trying desperately to utilize the trickle of wireless internet coverage to check his mail on a laptop computer.

The scene is all too familiar, but Rob Laltrello, associate director of Georgia Highlands� information technology (IT) department, says it could be a thing of the past as early as summer.

Laltrello, who has essentially built the various campuses� wireless networks from the ground up, has been working with the college for nearly a decade.

�It�s nice to see students who actually want to use the wireless,� says Laltrello. �I didn�t think the day would ever come, being the geek that I am.�

In point of fact, that trickle of coverage that reaches the student center was wholly accidental. �What students are really doing is hitting the Walraven and administrative access points by huddling near the window,� Laltrello said. �Once I put the F-Wing network there, you�ll have full coverage up and down F-Wing and the student center will be booming.�

Most of the wired internet ports in desks throughout F-Wing were removed during recent renovations, a development that has some GHC students concerned.

�It sends the message that Georgia Highlands is inconsiderate of the students,� remarked GHC biology major Latisha Stanley.

IT employees have been working on a campus-wide phone conversion that Laltrello says has detracted from the wireless endeavor. Fortunately, the phone issue is nearing resolution, and expanding the campuses� wireless coverage is next on the IT department�s to-do list.

It is estimated that total wireless coverage of the Floyd campus should be done by this summer, or fall 2006 at the very latest.

Students attending the Cartersville campus already have total wireless network coverage, and Chief Information Officer Jeff Patty says a small project is in the works for Heritage Hall.

As for access points at the Marietta and Acworth campuses, Laltrello says the school has yet to deploy any wireless network, adding that Marietta �is Southern Polytechnic�s beast right now.�

�We want the wireless in all the places that the students want the wireless just as bad as the students do,� said Laltrello. �We want coverage and it�s definitely a front burner issue.�