The Necessity of Universities to Provide Free Wi-Fi Services to Students
At my work placement, the MGI provides free Wi-Fi to its students. However, there have been numerous complaints on how this has badly affected the students’ grades. Some lecturers even argue that those students spend most of their time on their phones, rather than following classes. For instance, Mr.Abba, head of the Marathi department who said: “I had to ban phone in my classes as students would rather spend their time online, chatting with friends rather than following the lecture.” Similarly, a study published by the Journal of Media Education indicated that 97% of students admitted to using their phones in classes for non-educational purposes and the majority of them spent their time online. Likely, Susan Dynarski, a professor of education, public policy and economics at the University of Michigan, in the New York Times said: “They also tend to earn worse grades. The research is unequivocal: Laptops distract from learning, both for users and for those around them.”
Furthermore, providing free Wi-Fi will open up the opportunity for cheating and this has been confirmed in 2017 where Kessler International did a survey with 300 students and indicated that 72% of students used their phones to cheat in classes. At the same time, some students will abuse the free Wi-Fi to download large files like movies which will definitely slow down the entire network. This can cause numerous problems that will not be limited to the wireless network. As a result, if the school is hosting an important video conference through a wired connection, even they will be afflicted. As a matter of fact, in my survey conducted at MGI Universities 12 out of 20 students said that they download numerous large files on the school Wi-Fi. Yash a student I interviewed mentioned he only does so as the school Wi-Fi is faster compared to what he has at his place.
Another weak point of providing free Wi-Fi is that students may not always find top-notch research and sources on the web compared to a verified textbook. This turn facilitating internet access through free Wi-Fi can be a double edge sword where students may find an unlimited amount of information at their disposal but at the same time, that information may be unreliable. This has even been confirmed by the Lloyd Sealy Library which mentioned: “There is no quality assurance when it comes to information found on the Internet: Anyone can post anything.”
Not to mention, it is important to realize that on such a large network where thousands of students connect daily there is a big risk of hacking. For example, recently two students disabled their school’s Wi-Fi over several days in March 2019, according to an article from CBS. Nevertheless, the most disturbing part is that those two students are only 14 years old, now imagine what older students could do. Yet, this is only the tip of the iceberg because most of the Wi-Fi provided by universities is usually unsecured hence private information about the student such as credit card pin or password can be easily stolen.
Some of the people I interviewed even argue that Wi-Fi is costly since the equipment needed for wireless can eat some universities’ funds. Mr. Jason a lecturer told me: “Money that could be used elsewhere is being wasted on that Wi-Fi which will only make the student go on Facebook.” While investigating further, I found that some lecturers or even the administration are reluctant to provide free Wi-Fi as not only is it an additional cost but also according to them it is hard to monitor students’ activities. Mrs. Fatima, an administrative staff, said: “the only way to monitor students and know exactly what the student will be doing is only if they are using computers provided by the university since those devices will be in an open room other lecturers or staff can just walk around and monitor the students.”
Alternatively, with the fast development of technologies, a new generation of devices, like smartphones and Chromebooks, have emerged and they can no longer be catered by wired connections. In addition, Wi-Fi creates a new learning environment that wired connections do not. Regrettably, this opens up yet another problem as not all students have equal access to technological resources. Some students do not even have the luxury to buy a laptop or even own a phone. In short, providing students free Wi-Fi may end up increasing the gap between the rich and the poor.
All those downsides coupled with the administrative cost to manage the wireless network, the low-reliability that Wi-Fi connection has and even the mere fact that it may promote cyberbullying provide enough reasons, not to give student free Wi-Fi. Nonetheless, saying that Wi-Fi does not have any place in universities is a completely false statement and an old fashion of thinking. From both my survey and interviewed it seems that the free Wi-Fi is just being misused since there has been numerous survey like one done by the Wi-Fi Alliance which mention how 75% of student agree that Wi-Fi on campus helped them get better grades.
Another thing to keep in mind is that in today’s golden age of technologies, all the cons of providing free Wi-Fi to students can be, if not completely, partially reduced. For instance, a history professor at Randolph College in Virginia, Sara Eskridge said: “Students will always find a way to cheat” I share the same view as her since even if there was no free Wi-Fi available, students could just use their mobile data to access the internet and produce the same result if free Wi-Fi was accessible. To sum up, Wi-Fi does not really increase the amount of cheating by being freely provided.
The same can be said for Wi-Fi causing distraction in classes. If Wi-Fi is not provided, students will just use their mobile data. And again produce the similar negative effect of having free Wi-Fi. So whether there is Wi-Fi or not students will mostly find a way to distract themselves from what they think are boring classes. This is backed up by an assistant professor in the University of Health and Human Performance at Dalhousie University, Matthew Numer said in an article for The Chronicle of Higher Education that banning laptops is an “insult” to students: “Our students are capable of making their own choices, and if they choose to check Snapchat instead of listening to your lecture, then that’s their loss. Besides, it’s my responsibility as an educator to ensure that my lecture is compelling. If my students aren’t paying attention, if they’re distracted, that’s on me.” What he is trying to say is, the distraction of student sometimes are also because of the lecturer itself.
Using Wi-Fi over a wired connection is also more cost-effective compared to wire connection including wiring, labour, port, and configuration can add up to over Rs10760 according to Mr. Beedasy, a senior network administrator at the MGI. Unquestionably, adding new ports will require technical support which can exhaust universities’ funds in the long run. Even if universities can manage funds for such high infrastructural costs, they will less likely be able to provide enough ports for all students and staff. In conclusion, it can be more advantageous to provide free Wi-Fi instead of wired ports.
By now it is obvious that the downsides of providing free Wi-Fi can be reduced. With this in mind, what are the benefits of a university to provide Wi-Fi for its students? First and foremost, wired compared to Wi-Fi connection comes with a lot of restrictions, notably the lack of mobility. Hence, students can only get access from a specific physical location. In contrast, Wi-Fi does not have this problem. Everyone can access the internet from anywhere and at any time at the university campus.
Additionally, I also conducted a site survey at my work placement and found out that most network ports are not easily accessible to students. Sometimes there are only two or three network ports in a classroom of 40 students. Moreover, according to a survey, around 76% of all new laptop which are targeted at students such as Chromebook and budget laptops, no longer have a network port. Therefore, rendering them useless in an environment where there is no Wi-Fi. Moreover, according to my survey, the only students who bring their laptop on a daily basis are those taking the graphic and design class, as for the rest they bring their projects on their phone itself.
Despite the many benefits Wi-Fi has over wired connections, some universities still refuse to go forward with the wireless technology. According to one of the leaders for Communication and Information in UNESCO, Janis Karklins, “We can no longer ignore the fact that we live in a digital era. Today’s generation can be seen walking around with powerful gadgets and mobile computers.” Without a doubt, to enhance the student’s learning experience, universities must embrace changes and take advantage of the new technologies available. For instance, I interviewed, Yash who does Hinduism at MGI and he believes that having a Wi-Fi connection helps him a lot where he can perform research on the spot instead of going a home. And what he is saying makes sense because as I investigate further, it seems that, it is a big struggle for universities to keep up with updated technology. More often than not, we see many libraries or computer labs equipped with limited number of old wired computers, as opposed to number of students that need access to internet. Even at my work placement, the number of computer recourses is extremely limited. For example, the library has only 5 computers which have to be shared between both tertiary and secondary students. Moreover, student only has a 15 min time limit per day and sometimes the waiting list is so high that most students are unable to utilize those resources, according to a Liberian there. On the other side, if universities have Wi-Fi, they can save some serious funds on IT infrastructure costs by encouraging students to bring their own devices. Moreover, students bring their mobile phones nevertheless, so why not benefit from this advantage because investing in a wireless network is definitely less costly than in for universities to buy desktop.
Sara Eskridge even added: “technology such as Wi-Fi is a tool to be used in the classroom, rather than an end in itself”.One big pro of using Wi-Fi is that it aids students in understanding the lessons being discussed. Students have different learning styles and abilities. A teaching method may be effective for one student but may not work for another. Hence, having Wi-Fi in universities provides students with alternative references on topics with just one click. If they do not have internet access in their homes, they can immediately find the learning materials that they need while they are on university campus. Treven, a student said that he understands better looking at how things work visually instead of reading it in textbook. However the university he attends does not provide the necessary resources hence the only option is those free online simulation.
In the same way, students will also benefit from a new learning experience as lecturers can plan more creative and interactive activities in classes. According to my research, it seems that many lecturers are now using online simulators to give deep understanding to students on how a particular topic. A fitting example is about a lecturer in Minnesota who teaches Social Studies. Since for most of us, studying countries can be boring, he coded a website, known as Fantasy Geopolitics. This changes the way students looked at this subject. It even made the students more interested in the subject and craving to learn more. Overall, Wi-Fi enables students to finish tasks faster as they will be able to access numerous resources and tools in a matter of seconds. Moreover, students can have their progress monitored by their teacher who then can send out customised question or notes to the students. In addition, students will not be limited to their peers from their universities but can also work on projects with other students from other different universities throughout the world.
Furthermore, according to my survey out of twenty random students, all of them agree that free Wi-Fi should be provided to all students. What is more interesting is that nearly all of them made argued on why it should be provided. For instance, Yushna, a photography student, says that they could easily search for references online.
According to a report from Internet Usage Statistics in 2019, only 57.3% of people had access to internet. Consequently, by facilitating access to internet, we can decrease the unfairness in education. From my survey, I found out that every student agrees on the idea of providing free Wi-Fi and 97% of them does not have any problem if certain site like “facebook.com” or “youtube.com” is blocked as long they can get accessed to the internet. In conclusion, very few students want access to the internet for only using social media.
