Students at the University of Miami are reporting slow and unresponsive WiFi connections inside of buildings and Residential Colleges. They report lagging websites, needing to use cellular to study in the library and getting points taken off of assignments when things fail to load.
“[The Wi-Fi] cut out during a presentation and I got points off because I couldn’t load a video. It’s very frustrating to be paying this much money for tuition and not being able to access the internet,” said University of Miami student Ashley MacDougal.
Other students are unable to access necessary applications like the QR code in the dining hall, Zoom, BlackBoard and Canvas.
“In the dining hall, I can’t order using the QR codes unless I walk to the opposite end of the dining hall, and sometimes use cellular too. It’s very frustrating,” said UM student Ella Mead.
Ryan Chafee, a marine biology and ecology student said that the connection on his device interfered with his ability to land a job.
“I had a job interview over Zoom, and the wifi was so bad I got kicked out a few times,” says Chafee. “Overall, it’s been extremely bad, and I hope the school does something about it already.”
In a statement to The Hurricane, the University said that most students are able to successfully connect to Wi-Fi, although “various factors” can impact its performance.
“IT representatives meet bi-weekly with Student Government members on the topic of technology at the U and discuss any areas of concern related to Wi-Fi on campus,” the University said.
The University also said that they have invested in making changes to the Wi-Fi connections by upgrading access points across campus and onsite assessments in areas where issues are reported.
The reasons for these issues, they claim, could be a result of Apple making changes to Wi-Fi features in iOS and macOS or more students using VPN anonymizers.
Randy Advincula, a business tech student at UM, said that students can take steps towards improving the WiFi connection on their personal devices.
“Students with Mac devices can increase WiFi speed by turning off the Limit IP address setting and private relay setting,” Advincula said.
He also suggested moving to a less populated area with a different access point, like moving from the first to the second floor of the library, or to move away from a dead zone, which can be tested by an online internet speed test.
Many free Wi-Fi speed tests are available online, including the Fast.com owned by Netflix. The test essentially measures the download and upload speed of the Wi-Fi being used by your device in megabits per second, or Mbps.
While Advincula says that anything above 50 Mbps is good, Verizon indicates that anything above 100 Mbps is a good rule of thumb because it can connect several devices at one time.
After testing the Wi-Fi capabilities at various times during the day with Fast.com, the results concluded that most buildings on campus have sufficient Wi-Fi speed.
In Whitten, Cox and Shalala, the Wi-Fi speeds were 140 Mbps, 150 Mbps and 320 Mbps, respectively. In regard to the dorms, Pearson Residential College read 290 Mbps and Coral Residential College at 270 Mbps.
These numbers fluctuate throughout the day based on the number of students connected to the Wi-Fi at one time. The more “invisible waves” connected to the same access point, the slower the speed will be.
Despite these results showing that the signal strength was adequate, students still face Wi-Fi speed problems. The University advises students to contact the IT help desk or fill out the Software and Hardware Support form.