During last week’s governing board meeting, Northland Pioneer College President Dr. Chatto Hazelbaker discussed the college’s internet connectivity and informed the board that the college has the most connectivity of community colleges in the state.
NPC owns 11 microwave towers and is able to provide great reliable connectivity to campuses utilizing microwave links or leased line connectivity. With the additional broadband improvements coming to the region, including the Arizona Public Service fiber optic line that is going to run from Phoenix to Payson, Joseph City and then south again, this creates an opportunity for even broader access for the college as APS overbuilt to carry far more traffic than needed by the utility so that others can benefit from that infrastructure.
“What you’ll see when we add to the budget is an increase of about $350,000 a year for lease line connectivity. What that will allow us for the first time this year, is to connect every single one of our campuses with both leased line connectivity and the microwave towers. This is actually the best practice, which is to have redundant networks, so that if one system goes down you can keep going.
“We can afford this redundancy for a while. The question that’s going to be before the board over the next several years is how long can we afford this redundancy, or is there a better way to get it.”
Hazelbaker noted that approximately two years from now the college will have about a $2 million to $3 million dollar increase to upgrade the equipment on the microwave towers in order to keep them at the necessary speeds. “We will have to make the decision sometime down the road about whether we continue to make the capital investments to keep our tower system running.”
Added to that is the expanding use of virtual teaching in trades such as the beginning welding for safety reasons, or in the nursing program in order to not have to invest in actual cadavers. “One of the things about leased line connectivity is that we can call up the company that’s providing that leased activity and we can say we need to go from 10 to 20 or wherever we need to go in that sort of speed jump and they’re prepared to provide it.”
Regarding construction on the campuses, at the Show Low skills center site the retaining walls, concrete bunkers and drainage culverts are to be constructed and the first shipment of metal building arrived at the beginning of March. At the Silver Creek Campus in Snowflake, flood mitigation repairs are currently being done. In addition, underground utilities have begun.
At the Little Colorado Campus the modular building is being constructed in Phoenix, is almost complete and should be here at the end of March. The site prep has begun with information sent to utility companies for line extensions.
In other business, the board:
* Was presented with five-year finance performance summary of the online bookstore.
* Approved program modifications to degrees and programs including the Associate of Arts in Early Childhood, Associate of Business, Business Entrepreneurship Specialization, Business Management and Leadership Specialization, Medical Assistant, Business Medical Office Administration Specialization and Therapeutic Massages.
* Approved the 2022-2023 tuition rate.
* Approved Rim Country Mechanical to replace HVACC equipment at the Snowflake and Winslow campuses in the amount of $80,180.
* Approved the list of hearing officers for 2022-23.
* Approved $762,650 for Pointe Companies, Inc. for construction at the Northeast Arizona Training Center. This will include a new training simulator building and installation of the existing tiny houses to house those being trained at the facility.
* Approved the purchase of two high-fidelity patient simulators from Laerdal for a total cost of $108,990.
* Approved the purchase of audio/video equipment from CDW-G for five Connected Classrooms totaling $127,613 using CARES Act funds.
* Approved the purchase of 92 laptops totaling $99,632 using CARES Act funds.
* Approved the purchase of Cisco equipment and associated services for a total of $463,839 utilizing a Rural Utilities Services-Distance Learning and Technology grant that was awarded last year.
