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Phase 2 of the NEN trail expanded the NEN from a concept to a reality. During this phase, REANNZ connected a number of schools and content and service providers to KAREN, to test the architecture developed in Phase 1 and explore some of the pedagogical benefits of high speed broadband. Phase 2 included a number of stages:
The objectives of the NEN trial Phase 2 are to:
The outcomes of this project are:
This proof of concept began mid July 2008 and ended December 2009.
NEN phase IIB schools
NEN phase IIC additional schools
The Ministry accepted, as offered in NEN PIIB, four licences for Content and Service partners (CASP) for the duration of PIIB.
The nominated CASP’s are:
The existing Content partners i.e. TelstraClear, Te Papa, National Library, Christ College, KAREN Video Conferencing Service etc will remain in place.
At the same time as we achieve NEN outcomes, we are taking the chance to test and hopefully prove the value of certain teaching and learning outcomes across the ITPs and the Schools. TEC and MinEdu have driven these outcomes.
CORE Education has been contracted by the Ministry of Education and REANNZ to undertake a small-scale evaluation project to demonstrate the pedagogical benefits of being linked to the advanced network (KAREN), delivering the National Education Network (NEN). The following outcomes are identified for the proposed programme: A new proof of concept (PoC) school, after being connected, is able to articulate the benefits of being connected. A new PoC school can point to one or more specific activities that have been made possible by being connected. It is expected that the evaluation will be used to encourage and promote a deeper understanding of the role that ICT and advanced network technologies can play in the provision of 21st Century teaching and learning programmes as provided for within the NZ curriculum. CORE has engaged Suzi Gould to coordinate the evaluation, and she will work with Derek Wenmoth and Allan Sylvester to engage with the teachers and schools who are a part of the NEN trial during the first part of term four. In designing the evaluation process emphasis will be given to the following:
A key focus of the evaluation project will be the gathering of evidence and artifacts that will endure beyond the time-frame of the project, and remain available to inform future projects. These will include:
The evaluation work will occur in a variety of ways, including face-to-face meetings and audio and video conferences with participating teachers. These interviews should not be too time consuming, and will focus on work that has already occurred as well as projects that are still running in term four. Teachers in participating schools will be contacted early in the new term to arrange times for visits or linking by audio or video conference. Key contacts: [derek@core-ed.net] or [suzi.gould@learn-it.co.nz]
Test the value in the following three areas that in turn support Tertiary Education Strategy:
Connecting up Schools, Service and Content providers and aggregators for the National Education Network trial has demonstrated that this connection process is a bespoke, sequential and relatively complicated. The internal REANNZ process for completing a “single site connection” request is initiated when the connection information is received in accordance with [connections@reannz.co.nz]
REANNZ requests that the “single site connection” form needs to be completed in full. Missing detail has resulted in site connection delays and, potentially,non-compliance with KAREN standards.
The following information is requested for every connection.
Most fields in the “single site connection” request form need to be made mandatory before the connection process will commence. An update to that form has been drafted. This may assist the current process but may not solve the root core problem. A number of issues within the connection process are apparent at this early stage and all need assessment.
The connection process has inherent delays because of not only REANNZ Service Level Agreements (SLA) and in addition the SLA’s of the outsourced third party equipment also adds to the timeline and coordination requirements. As an example any physical or logical MAC update to the KAREN core has a 10 and 5 day lead time requirement with TCL. The cumulative effect of the SLA’s involved in any one connection makes for unacceptable time frames when considering the overall time to connect up a NEN entity.
Most of the new NEN trial customers have experienced connection difficulties. Due to…
In summary. The NEN connection process must be improved and simplified and not assume detailed technical knowledge is necessarily available for all NEN educational participants. This area needs a careful holistic analysis and a relevant solution.
Work is progressing on providing DW German TV over KAREN for the NEN trial. It is planned to distribute this content as multi cast stream originating from Christ College in Christchurch. The provisioning of this content along with the ability to receive DW TV has raised a number of multi cast issues. Some comments arising follow:
Some equipment connected / connecting to the NEN appear not to adhere to the KAREN multicast standards and specs. The requirements are.
There seems to be a lack of technical understanding around multicast. Possibly because multicast has not been widely used commercially in New Zealand. Some of the loan and new hardware being connected to KAREN as a compliant edge device appear not comply with KAREN BGP and multicast standards.
It is intended to build up a repository of technical information, initially router configurations, that have been deployed by organisations connecting to the National Education Network.
The Technical Centre at the KAREN website contains details and standards of the technical requirements for connecting to KAREN and the National Education Network (NEN).
It is necessary to meet these standards to be considered a compliant connection. Organisations considering connecting to the NEN should clearly understand their technical requirements and obligations. If you are in any doubt please seek professional assistance.
Please note:
Ensure you have access to your External DNS provider / self service portal If using an ISP you can schedule the DNS record changes to be enabled at a certain time to allow you to perform the cutover to KAREN out of hours Allow up to 24 Hrs for world wide DNS to converge / update. Employ an intermediate DNS server to allow redirection of non reachable websites / resources on KAREN back to the common internet addresses.
Avoid asymmetrical routing. This can be caused by firewalls and / or multiple gateways. Symptoms of this problem are strange communication errors between certain types of mail server and FTP sites losing their connection.
If your mail server supports it you can make use of the MXCACHE file to temporarily deliver mail where DNS is incorrect. Remove RDNS antispam methods until you have time to monitor mail queues and fine tune antispam again. Add a temporary secondary mail server on the ‘old’ public network as a relay to deliver mail which is undeliverable via the KAREN network. This will allow you to keep mail flowing normally overnight when unmonitored and reduce administrator pressure. Ensure your RBL lists are contactable via the KAREN network otherwise mail could be lost depending on you antispam settings.
A strategy for a pilot connection to KAREN
Setup a mail server with a verbose console (Ex: Mdaemon trial) on a machine connected to the Karen network. Setup this machine to use KAREN DNS and allow it to relay mail from your existing mail server IP only. Set your existing mail to temporarily relay outgoing mail via the Mail relay and monitor delivery queues. Ensure you have registered a RDNS record for your mail relay. Test and monitor email delivery. Remove the mail forwarding if undeliverable queues build faster than you can troubleshoot them.
Setup a proxy server with a KAREN public IP / DNS and direct a proportion of users to use this for web access. Test and monitor.
Management events and recommendations
This is a sequential log of problems and the solutions encountered when joining KAREN whereas the technical paper is a set of recommendations.
The National Education Network Proof of Concept (PoC) Phase 2 came to a conclusion at the end of December 2008. The NEN PoC PII culminated with a video conference (vc) that involved a number of participants including Appleby School, Mangamaire School, Wellington College, Wellington GHS, Christ College, Kristin School, ARNET,Pt England School, National Library and REANNZ. This celebratory session was managed by Core Ed as part of their contract with REANNZ. The objective of the celebration was to bring a number of parties together to share their experiences of being connected to the NEN. This vc took place on the 11th December and was considered a success based on the feedback received.
A prior vc occurred on the 10th December with Mangamaire School, REANNZ, the Taraura District Council and local people, InspireNet and with invited personnel from TUANZ. Mangamaire School is a primary School with 44 students and has recently been connected onto an InspireNet fibre. Mangamaire School participated in this vc using a PC, Mirial licence and a low cost web cam. The vc demonstrated that low end and low cost equipment can provide a meaningful vc experience when the upstream bandwidth is not constrained i.e. on the NEN.
The NEN PII has delivered a number of strategic outcomes. In summary:
National Education Network Phase II report - January 2009
National Education Network - 21st Century Learning Challenge report - January 2009