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Alumni and Matching Gifts Boost Wireless Campaign
By Rachel Wegner 07
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The check represents alumni gifts toward the recent fundraising campaign to increase wireless Internet access on the ORU campus. This check moves ORU closer to its ultimate goal of raising $360,000. Below, Carr answers questions about the wireless campaign.
What does this check mean to ORU?
This check means so much, not simply to the success of the wireless campaign, but to the students, faculty and staff. Especially for the students, the implementation of a wireless campus at ORU is not just a blessing, it is a necessity! It contributes to the success and capability of each and every student. It is hard to put this in the right perspective for alumni who, perhaps like me, graduated and left ORU prior to the technology we see available today. For today's prospective student, wireless Internet access is as much a utility to them as air conditioning or electricity is. It is hard to convince a future college student to leave their fully wireless home for a place that may only have partial wireless coverage. This check helps insure that we are able to meet the campus expectations of new and current ORU students!
As an alumnus of ORU, what is the significance of seeing alumni give back to something like the wireless campaign?
My time back here at ORU has been so special. Having spent the majority of my career managing technology within the corporate television industry, stepping into this office at ORU has been my way of giving back to the university in a real and tangible way. In that same context, I feel the alumni response to the wireless campaign has been a very significant event! The most incredible part of this wireless campaign has been all of the alumni who also took a step in giving something to the university in a real and tangible way. Through their gifts, a major technological implementation is able to be accomplished that has a real life impact on every student that walks through these doors. Just today I walked past a classroom and noticed that nearly every student was participating in class with their laptop. It is something that, as those alumni visit campus, they will be able to see their contribution in place and operational as they observe the students walking about with laptops and other wireless devices.
What kinds of things will this money be applied to? How will it change ORU?
For a wireless implementation, there are core network components needed as well as a software system that helps handle the administration of the network which includes the network traffic, security and even analyzing maintenance of components. These core elements (along with wireless access points) are targeted according to the level of funding from the wireless campaign. Of course, it is always possible to do more, but we have taken great lengths to insure we deliver the most possible for our students, faculty and staff. This campaign effort will allow us to cover every area of every floor in the Graduate Center, the Learning Resources Center, Timko-Barton, the lobbies of each dorm, and everywhere outside [on the campus grounds].
The change at ORU will be immediate and incredible. One of the most requested capabilities by students and faculty will be able to be met as a result of this effort: providing wireless Internet access in the classroom. We'll suddenly be able to go from a mere few classrooms with this designation to every classroom within the Graduate Center, every classroom within the Learning Resources Center, and especially everywhere a student might be working, studying, or learning suddenly provided with full wireless access. It is a very exciting prospect!
