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Ask HN: I want to put free WiFi in schools in my city, how do I go about it?

• codingdave 3y ago
  Most districts have someone in charge of technology, and they probably would love to get more resources and support. Find out who they are, call them, and start a conversation. Because even if they welcome the help with open arms, schools often already have vendors they work with, so you want to understand the status quo and then fill gaps in their existing tech.
• dewey 3y ago
  There's https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eduroam https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eduroam which was founded for this use case and allows students to even roam between multiple universities. Maybe a starting point?
• tetris11 3y ago
  For 2) https://eduroam.org/how/ https://eduroam.org/how/ > eduroam is based on 802.1X* and a linked hierarchy of RADIUS servers containing users’ data (usernames and passwords). Participating institutions must have operating RADIUS infrastructure and agree to the terms of use. eduroam can be set up in three easy steps: https://www.serverwatch.com/networking/radius-server/ https://www.serverwatch.com/networking/radius-server/ > RADIUS works based on a client/server model. Users connect to a RADIUS client, which is a network access server (NAS). The NAS then verifies the user’s information through the RADIUS authentication server. The connection information can include details such as a username, a password, and an IP address.
  • twosdai 3y ago
    Great answer. I think though that this response is predicated on the school's coming from a relatively developed nation. If the poster is not from one and is talking about getting free internet in locations that don't have it at all for their school I think the answer would be different. Because then it's mainly about the cheapest technology that can get it done, and won't be touched or bothered by anyone because it's not worth it.
    • yau8edq12i 3y ago
      Why would that only work in "relatively developed nations"? People from less "developed" nations aren't stupid savages, they just have access to fewer resources. Look at this map https://eduroam.org/where/ https://eduroam.org/where/ The countries where eduroam don't exist are mainly just countries that don't have international academic visibility, with universities that are mainly focused on teaching to local students rather than conducting bleeding-edge research. Again, not because they're idiots, but just because with fewer resources you have to prioritize. Setting up 802.1X and RADIUS servers isn't much more expensive than setting up e.g. an email server, and you can bet that they know about email even in those places you consider less "developed".
      • geraldhh 3y ago
        because it only works in countries that have their international relations developed enough in order to be included
        • refulgentis 3y ago
          Wat? It's software.
          • lxgr 3y ago
            Not at all, it’s a network. A new provider joining has security implications. You get all devices with Eduroam configured to auto-connect to your access point, for one thing. You could say that that’s no worse than providing unencrypted Wi-Fi with a common SSID that people might have configured on their devices as auto-connectable, but I think the perception of Eduroam as being better than that (due to being encrypted) does exist. To efficiently manage that, Eduroam is set up as a “federation of federations”. To join, you’d have to work with your country’s academic/research network organization (NREN), which are often affiliated with tertiary education institutions. These have very different problem domains than primary or secondary schools. For example, most people eligible to access Eduroam will be adults.
• arielcostas 3y ago
  > What sort of infrastructure would i need for one school with reliable strength? Any recommendations for actual equipment? What is the price estimate/range for one school in the first approach? Are there any companies that already exist that offer this solution including the login stuff as well? You need multiple APs and then an authentication/authorisation system that allows navigation for users once you know who they are and that they should have access to the network. The difference between both systems relies mainly on the authentication, and in both cases, most equipment vendors provide options to set a Guest Portal up. The other option would be to host a RADIUS server (also referred to as WPA Enterprise) that does the authentication. The regional administration where I live maintains some sort of student network for schools too, and they use RADIUS. They maintain a public website where user credentials are managed (you identify with a username/password they give you and you can change those credentials) and then connect to the wifi using those credentials Again, how you deploy this, depends in many cases on the vendor you choose and what they support.
• deleted 3y ago
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• xyzzy123 3y ago
  You didn't mention what country you're in or what level of schools you're targeting. This matters a lot. ----- A lot of people think schools are kind of "naive" and "under-resourced" but you will quickly find at least in au/nz that even primary/intermediate schools are quite a lot more regulated / bureaucratic than you might expect. I'm guessing the US could be even worse. Schools already have Internet. So, why do they need yours? Why should they trust you? What kind of organisation are you? How many of you are there? I noticed you mentioned "student ID and password" for auth. Are you expecting the school to provide you with this information? Do you like paperwork? Even if it's free, if you have equipment on their grounds and are providing a service to students you'll need a contract with the school. What's your privacy policy? What kind of SLA are you providing? Is the support free as well? You'll probably have to go through their supplier/vendor assessment process and there may be heavy restrictions around authorised suppliers. Are you going to have staff or contractors visiting the school grounds on a regular basis? Understand they'll need various background checks etc and you'll have to keep this stuff up to date. Be prepared to learn a lot about the various standards and regulations schools and their suppliers have to comply with. A key question is, are you going to do traffic filtering yourself or use a commercial service? You cannot provide a "raw" feed to students. The kind of traffic filtering and monitoring available to schools is now far more advanced than what people used to do for free with netfilter/squid. For sure, when little Timmy sees a disturbing _news article_ while hooked up to your feed eventually you will get complaints about this which will go from child -> parent -> school -> you. The kind of filtering schools need now costs money, how are you providing this service for free again?
  • Loughla 3y ago
    This is 100% the answer for Western countries. Most k-12 schools have decent wireless in the US today. And they also have massive restrictions on its use due to all of those reasons.
    • geraldhh 3y ago
      > And they also have massive restrictions on its use due to all of those reasons. not sure if crippled institutional wifi offers any tangible benefit in the age of ubiquitous cellular internet access besides the usual incentive of researching technical workarounds to the filtering.
• mtmail 3y ago
  Sounds similar to https://www.eff.org/pages/openwirelessorg https://www.eff.org/pages/openwirelessorg In Germany we have https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freifunk https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freifunk who put up network in open places and under-served areas like refugee shelters. But government also added wifi to all schools I know of (and the refugee shelters).
  • zelphirkalt 3y ago
    Huh. I am out of school for a long time now, but honestly I would be very surprised they managed to really get WLAN to all schools. They haven't even managed to get it to all train stations. Do you have reliable information, that now all schools have to have WLAN, by law or something?
• aaron695 3y ago
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• jacksonhacker 3y ago
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• mattbrewsbytes 3y ago
  Most schools have entire departments of IT people with Director level people that have job responsibilities to do what you describe. If it is a US public school they are probably restricted in dealing with specific vendors and/or a formal RFP process. Also you're dealing with the state/local government essentially with US public schools so be prepared for a lengthy process, background checks inclusive of checking the background/validity of your company as well as any people. That is even if the school would consider outsourcing this, again they have staff that do this work and support it. If you feel that compelled to help your local school(s), a donation would be much easier logistically.
• xchip 3y ago
  Why do schools need wifi?
  • ratg13 3y ago
    Surprised nobody is asking this. In places like France this is even against the law, and personally I am of the opinion that it is for the better.
    • aceofspades19 3y ago
      Its not against the law in France: https://skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/55977/did-france-ban-wifi-in-schools-and-daycares-in-2015-because-of-health-concerns https://skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/55977/did-franc... I'm not really sure it matters if wifi is not allowed in schools as cellphones are so prevalent now so you aren't stopping anyone from accessing the internet if they really want to.
  • helsinkiandrew 3y ago
    At my son's school (Finland) the students are loaned a laptop/chromebook for coursework, communication etc. Particularly since the Covid lockdown.
    • philomath_mn 3y ago
      My kids' school in rural Midwest US has been giving every kid an ipad and providing wifi on the bus since ~2014. They had classroom WiFi in early 2000s at the latest. Really not sure what OOP is talking about.
    • xchip 3y ago
      Right but what is the point of having internet in a school?
  • codingdave 3y ago
    Because teachers use technology. Students use tablets/laptops. These are standard tools of modern education.
• t312227 3y ago
  hello, as always: imho… idk, but at first this is an organizational problem: what do you try to solve with this? from what i understand: you have a problem: <which one!?> your solution: put free wifi in schools or even "citywide" ... again: whats the problem you are trying to solve with this!? why i'm asking this: its 2024 ... 1. why isn't that infrastructure already available in those schools? lack of money? lack of ...? 2. where / in which country are you? every school in every at least "somewhat" developed ("western") or generally somewhat "industrialized" country should have wlan for their students by now ... why isn't that already present in yours!? the technical approach: you need: * controller * access-points * connection-links between controller/aps/... (which would be parts of the LAN of a school for example ... but city-wide you'll need some kind of fixed lines) * uplink(s) to "the internet" authentification ... there are multiple possibilities, but the tried and true approach would be: * RADIUS (which can be used by the controller(s)) * LDAP (as the backend for the RADIUS server) equipment: do you want it to work or do you want to work on it!? expensive, but "works" - out of my head * cisco * aruba * ... they are expensive, but they are "enterprise ready" and stable ... costs ... depending on which company you choose, what conditions you are getting from the distributor etc. - i remember the price for schools/universities are sometimes only 2/3rds or even half of the "official" customer-prices advertised if you buy them via an "official institution" - university/school/... so this is more an "estimate": * access-points: a few 100 € to over 1000 € * controller: multiple 1000 € to 10+ k € a piece - for a somewhat "larger" installation you need 2 for redundancy/availability of the network depending on the size of the area and the size of the buildings themselves you are trying to cover, you need for example 20, 30 ... 50 or even more access-points + 2 controllers => which quickly adds up to something like 50 k or 100k € for a medium sized areal + buildings. you have to distribute the access-points in a meaningful manner - idk. for example avoid interference from aps within your building from the floor above or beyond the one you are in, you have to "interleave" them ... not just put the aps to the same place in every floor etc. (this enhances the operational distance for an ap and therefore reduces the number of aps needed for the building) you want to take into account the possible number of clients in certain rooms/places etc. ... the controllers need to have enough aps to be able to "balance" the number of clients on to multiple aps ... for example within a larger area or hall etc. just my 0.02€
• joenot443 3y ago
  I mean this kindly - I notice that this is one of many, many questionable Ask HN posts you've made, most of which end up with nearly no engagement. I get the impression from the questions you ask that you're not an engineer, in which case I don't really know that putting WiFi in schools is a good investment of your time. You're going to have a hard time finding schools interested in taking you seriously without some level of credentials. If you're feeling inclined to help in better equipping kids with tech, donating to Kids Teach Tech or Black Girls Code etc might be a better use of your resources.
• tialaramex 3y ago
  > similar to the edu network in the US Presumably you mean Eduroam? It's global, the Americans were actually (as with so many things) late to adopt, but it works just as well for a student from Edinburgh to use WiFi in Waikato (New Zealand) as for a student from Tokyo to use WiFi in Harvard (Mass).
  • lxgr 3y ago
    Importantly, these are all (to my knowledge) tertiary education institutions, i.e. people eligible for Eduroam access are adults. Very different domain.
    • tialaramex 3y ago
      Although historically Eduroam, like Internet access itself, began at research institutions and where they do tertiary education, there's nothing stopping a K12 from having Eduroam. They need to be able to tie all the Eduroam enabled account credentials to specific humans so that when the University of Plymouth says "This user was downloading porn videos and that's not OK by our usage policy" you can tie that to 15 year old Steve Smith in class 8F and tell him to use his WiFi network at home to watch porn. But it's not about adulthood, universities have always had a small number of non-adult students, acting "in loco parentis" to try to keep them out of harm's way as much as real parents likely would for a teenager. Eduroam doesn't care what your country says about majority, ages of responsibility etc. it just wants to tie every user to a member institution via an NREN.
      • lxgr 3y ago
        > Eduroam doesn't care what your country says about majority, ages of responsibility etc. Oh, I'm not saying that this was an explicit design goal of Eduroam, but I strongly suspect that there would be a whole new set of challenges the organizations running it might not be prepared for if they were to extend it to K12. Your customer base heavily influences the types of issues people might try to hold you responsible for, whether it's reasonable or not.
• jonathantf2 3y ago
  There might also be some legal implications by doing this - in the UK we have to log everything at student ever goes on or searches to be compliant with safeguarding regulation.
• bastawhiz 3y ago
  I've got to ask...why? If the schools don't already have WiFi, they don't have curriculums that could use it. Or they have internet access that's wired and no computers that would be on the WiFi anyway, and then you're just connecting kids' phones (which already have internet). Besides the wild amounts of red tape in the US that the other commenters mention, don't you think what you're doing is creepy? If I had kids, I 100% would NOT want some random guy to be using his own money to build a WiFi network in my kid's school. The optics of that are terrible. How do I know you're not going to be creeping on the network traffic? There's no obvious reason for you to 1) want to do this project and 2) not just give the money to the schools' existing IT staff to do it (and I'm sure most districts would gladly accept a gift like that). Seriously, why do YOU need to be the one doing it?
  • jjordan 3y ago
    Who do you think actually builds out the wifi networks at schools? It's not exactly the Fine Arts teacher running CAT6 and creating subnets for the different departments. It's better to assume positive intent until proven otherwise when people want to help out their communities.
    • theandrewbailey 3y ago
      > It's better to assume positive intent until proven otherwise when people want to help out their communities. That might work in places like Japan or Scandinavia where there's high social trust. People in other places are very suspicious when a rando wants to be around everyone's kids.
    • bastawhiz 3y ago
      Asking "I'm an IT guy for a school district and I'm looking for guidance on WiFi" is very different from "I want to put Wifi in the schools." Even if the op is indeed doing it from a place of good intent, I really, really struggle to read this ask as being from someone inside the schools already. They didn't say "my schools" or "our schools". They said "login at any school in the city", not something like "any of the schools I manage" or "any schools in the district". Even for someone who doesn't speak English as their first language, the word choice consistently suggests OP is an external third party. Maybe it's a very American concern of mine, but I simply do not trust anyone who is proactively trying to do something like this as a benevolent third party. And you probably shouldn't either! Would you sleep well at night knowing that some random guy external to your kid's school (with ~no governance or accountability) has unfettered access to their WiFi?
• kickofline 3y ago
  I work in a school IT department. We have full Wi-Fi coverage of all our buildings. We definitely have filtering in place, both DNS and managed extensions on student Chromebooks. We use Cisco Meraki switches and APs for connectivity, with Cisco Umbrella for DNS filtering. The Federal Government has programs like E-Rate that reimbursee districts for up to 90% of the cost of getting internet access for students, but like other commenters have said, paperwork. Unless you can get full support from the superintendent/board, bureaucracy will 100% be your biggest obstacle.
• RecycledEle 3y ago
  FYI, Laws require filtering and a lot more. (This is why I love Libertarians.)
• runjake 3y ago
  What country? If in the US, the school should be buying equipment through the E-rate program where the federal government will pay for 80% of it and installation.