Many students attending Grand Valley State University rely on campus Wi-Fi in order to complete their academic work, which they’re able to access by logging into the network with their student credentials. However, over the past several weeks, students have experienced connectivity issues when trying to connect to the “GV-Student” network.

Miranda Wojda, a GVSU student, has experienced connectivity issues all over campus beginning during finals week of the fall semester. She said other students she has talked to couldn’t connect to the network in their classrooms.

“Everyone has had the same issue,” Wojda said. “In class, no one could get their laptops to connect.”

For students who use their laptops or tablets in class, this causes many issues. With their connection not working, they may not be able to take notes or access files online.

Some students have tried disconnecting and reconnecting to the network but for many, including Wojda, this did not work.

“I have also tried the classic ‘turning it off and back on again’ but it didn’t do anything,” Wojda said.

Wojda works as a Residence Assistant in the Johnson Living Center on campus, and with the role, it’s important that she has access to the internet in order to do her job or work on homework in her residence hall. She said the internet being down has impacted her ability to file important reports regarding her residents. She also said that this issue has also impacted her school work due to the fact that she could not access her homework or the Blackboard website. 

When faced with technological issues, students and staff are able to contact the school’s Information Technology department located in room 10 at the Mary Idema Pew Library on campus. 

According to the IT website, wireless connection may be slower due to the shared nature of the Wi-Fi network.

“Wireless networking and the Internet are shared technologies – all devices connected to a wireless access point share the total speed of that one wireless access point,” the website stated. 

It’s also mentioned on the site that throughout the years, the number of access points across campus have tripled in an attempt to minimize the number of devices connected to each access point. However, adding more access points doesn’t always fix the issue, as more wireless contentions come with each additional access point. 

When asked for a comment, the GVSU IT department stated that “IT has not identified any widespread issues with the wireless network.” 

If students are looking for ways to attempt to fix their network issue, IT lists a few things to try. Students should make sure they are connected to the “GV-Student” network, and should also try restarting the device trying to be connected. If those attempts fail, the next thing to do would be to “forget” the network and set it up again or reset your password. 

IT adds that if you have information of such connectivity issues and questions you would like to ask, students can contact them at [email protected].