Case Study: Annie Wright Schools achieves BYOD enablement, faster throughput, and advanced Layer 7 security with Palo Alto Networks

Hogwarts Works Magic with the Next-Generation Firewall

Annie Wright Schools is a private preschool–12 school in Tacoma with about 500 students (including ~100 boarders) and a largely Mac-based environment. Constant, 24/7 device usage—hundreds of laptops, gaming consoles and phones—exposed the legacy WatchGuard firewall’s limits: poor visibility, inability to enforce user-based policies or BYOD, bandwidth and latency problems, and an unmanageable policy workflow for a two-person IT team.

The school deployed a Palo Alto Networks PA-500 next‑generation firewall with Threat Prevention and PAN‑DB URL Filtering (plus IPS, QoS, scheduling, AD integration and captive portal), resolving throughput and latency issues while enabling user-based app control and safe BYOD. The rollout restored reliable Skype and streaming performance, improved layer‑4 to layer‑7 security and reporting, cut policy management time by ~2–3 days/month, and eliminated $15,000 in hardware plus ongoing costs.

Annie Wright Schools

Bob Williamson

Network Administrator