With the global COVID-19 pandemic has come a new set of IT challenges for higher education. Engaging students and preparing them for new and evolving careers just became much harder. Thank goodness technology can assist with the challenges.  

The list of challenges facing the industry today is clear:

• Improve student learning outcomes and success
• Deploy new styles of teaching
• Improve remote/online learning- a need especially  heightened by COVID-19
• Extend connectivity with drive-In learning, remote sites, and mobile Wi-Fi hot spots
• Manage cybersecurity risks which have been heightened by extended and remote online access
• Ensure compliance with evolving government requirements
• Manage IT costs
• Prepare for the new normal in a post-COVID-19 world

With digital transformation higher education Institutions are constantly striving for progress and stability. With the environments constantly changing, schools must look to their network as the backbone to effectively adapt to the demands of the industry.

It’s high time that higher education starts taking advantage of the benefits of cloud infrastructure.

Our survey of over 200 education IT professionals found that 94% of education institutions are hosting at least one solution in the cloud. This includes email platforms, learning management systems (LMS), student information systems, CRM, curriculum content, and teaching devices.

And while 17% of education institutions currently manage their IT network in the cloud, 40% plan to move their IT network to the cloud in 1-5 years.

Why should education institutions have a cloud infrastructure management strategy now? Here are some of the benefits:

• Lower infrastructure management costs
• Ease of interoperability, system integration, and data exchange, including remote access of data for remote locations and online classes
• Flexibility and scalability
• Improved security
• Intelligent analytics and AI/ML-powered insights
• Increased network reliability (100% uptime for ExtremeCloudIQ)

Extreme Networks is dedicated to the complex requirements unique to educational institutions. Extreme Networks infrastructure management solution, ExtremeCloud IQ is designed to support higher education and deliver the highest levels of student data protection, management, and compliance needed to take on the evolving industry demands.

Check out this ExtremeCloud IQ in action video for Higher Education!