J.P. Schwartz Inc. delivers IT solutions to Catalyst EDU

About Catalyst Education of Colorado

Catalyst EDU, a 501(c)(3) charitable non-profit opened its doors in Lafayette, Colorado, in the fall of 2007. Catalyst EDU will ultimately serve up to 75 students identified as at-risk for dropping out of high school due to personal, social, physical, emotional, or mental health issues.

Created to be the affordable academic home for struggling teens seeking a meaningful alternative education; Catalyst EDU provides a nurturing and challenging educational community where at-risk high school-aged students can emerge from personal crisis, gain control of their decisions and actions, develop resiliency and confidence, and complete high school as responsible, curious young adults with solid academic and social skills.

Catalyst EDU Computer Requirements

In order to prepare the Catalyst EDU campus for students, they needed computers, internet connectivity, and the ability to keep it working for students. This created quite a challenge for a brand new school.

Catalyst EDU came to J.P. Schwartz with a few goals for the network. In order for the school to operate efficiently the network needed to provide support for the staff and administration as well as provide a safe learning experience for students. This was done by utilizing a variety of software and a few different types of systems, some PC based and some Macintosh. In addition, Catalyst EDU expressed an interest in allowing students to use their own equipment via the school’s wireless internet connection.

Catalyst EDU also had a few security requirements for its network. Catalyst realized that students like to experiment on the internet and on the computers they are working on, and wanted to be able to safely encourage this type of activity in their learning environment. However, in order to do so, the computers and network needed to support this activity without causing damage to any systems, generating a lot of support calls, risking data loss for staff and students, or exposing students to inappropriate internet content.

As a startup 501(c)(3), Catalyst EDU needed to be judicious about managing initial startup costs as well as ongoing expenses. One way to keep initial costs down was to make use of donated computer equipment and software in the final design and implementation while minimizing operational costs for the network as a whole.

The J.P Schwartz Solution

Undaunted by the many conflicting needs and the somewhat restricted budget, J.P. Schwartz came up with the following solutions for Catalyst EDU:

A review of the requirements and interviews with teachers determined that there were three system user groups that needed to be accommodated and supported by Catalyst EDU. First, staff computers needed to be set up and staff-created data needed to be protected in much the same way that any basic office environment would. We utilized an IBM x3200 series server running Microsoft’s 2003 server that will control security, acting as a central file storage location and provideing backups.

The second user group included the student-used lab computers. These computers will be maintained by Catalyst EDU, and therefore must be easy to attend to should there be any software problems in the future. Using Symantec’s Ghost Solution Suite, images of each PC were created and saved on the server allowing for a quick reset of all the software on a computer if a problem arises. This solution also allows software to be added to the image, and quickly deployed to all the student computers making upgrading and updating easy to implement.

The third user group included student computers, personal equipment, or general public guests that require internet access. Because personal equipment will not be supported by the school, they cannot be allowed to introduce virus or other security problems to the staff or student network. In order to isolate the staff and administrative equipment from personal computers from the computers within the student lab, a Fortigate 100A firewall was employed to scan for virus problems, as well as stop inappropriate content, spam, and various internet-based attacks.

The network itself was divided into the same three groups. The server will provide support for both students and staff, but be unavailable to public systems. Students can log on to lab computers only, but staff can log on anywhere.

The backup solution consists of a combination of internet-based and local backups which allows for often-changing data to be backed up automatically off site via the internet. Much larger quantities of static data is backed up monthly and taken off site. This backup solution is cost effective and requires very little maintenance from the Catalyst EDU staff.

Wireless networks were installed for staff and public access. The bandwidth is throttled on the public side, so that student and staff access is not slowed by outside users. In addition, the Fortigate’s content filtering system prevents anyone from using the school’s public wireless network to access inappropriate sites.

A large number of volunteers will work with Catalyst EDU so remote access was configured and secured to allow support from IT, accountants, and other key support staff which makes it easy for people to donate their time to Catalyst EDU since work can be done remotely.

Computers and a large amount of software were donated to Catalyst EDU. In order to take best advantage of the donations, memory and a few other hardware upgrades were implemented, printers were configured, and all computers were given clean operating system to establish the most effective working environment as the school opened.

To fill in the holes where equipment was not donated, J.P. Schwartz helped Catalyst EDU select and order the appropriate hardware or software. This included the firewall, IBM server, network switch and wireless, backup solution, antivirus, and imaging software.

To ensure the Catalyst EDU network is cost effective to maintain for years to come, a number of design concepts were implemented. Already mentioned are the automated backup solution, three separate security areas, a hardware-based firewall, and system images. Additionally, network security will prevent unauthorized computers from plugging in, automatic patch management will keep systems up to date, and staff training and full written documentation will allow for fast and efficient IT support in the future.

As part of the goals of J.P. Schwartz, Inc. we believe in giving back to the community. The mission of Catalyst EDU and its status as a non-profit made it an ideal candidate for a charitable contribution. J.P. Schwartz donated all the time and expertise required of us to design and implement the Catalyst EDU network. We wish them the best of luck in their mission of helping at-risk students to finish their High School degrees.

A Comment From Ed Porritt, Founder of Catalyst EDU

I’m proud to introduce you to John Schwartz and the talented computer network design engineers at J.P. Schwartz, Inc. They came to Catalyst EDU at a time when, before we could even open the doors, we had a critical need for computers and not a lot of time or budget. They were able to minimize those limitations and give us everything we needed for the administrative team, staff and students to work with. Not only did we need accessible computers in order to open our doors as a school, but to move forward with our essential mission of providing a place for at-risk students to excel when other academic situations have not worked them. If you have a need for computer network set up or evaluation, or if you just want to make sure your critical business information is protected, please allow me to recommend J.P. Schwartz, Inc. to you. I can’t say enough about the terrific job they’ve done for Catalyst Education of Colorado.

To contact Catalyst EDU, please visit their website at:

www.catalystedu.org