Case Study: Annie Wright Schools achieves campus-wide reliable Wi‑Fi and simplified network management with HPE Aruba Networking

Annie Wright Schools embraces network as a service (NaaS) to maintain digital progress

Annie Wright Schools, a 140‑year‑old K–12 school in Tacoma with about 800 students (including 132 boarders) and a two‑person IT team, needed a measured, tightly governed approach to digital learning. The school faced misaligned budget cycles and campus Wi‑Fi blackspots but required reliable, secure connectivity to support a one‑laptop‑per‑student policy, boarding students, and sensitive medical devices.

Annie Wright adopted Network as a Service using HPE Aruba hardware and HPE GreenLake, with ClearPass and Aruba Central for centralized management. The subscription model shifted costs to OpEx, simplified provisioning and troubleshooting, remapped coverage (one AP per classroom in grades 6–12), eliminated dorm connectivity gaps, enabled secure device access, and reduced the workload on the small IT team while delivering predictable pricing.

Annie Wright Schools

Erik Weiss

Network Administrator