In addition, a 2018 survey conducted by EDUCAUSE, a nonprofit association that aims to help higher education integrate IT solutions, highlighted how information security is the top concern for campus tech personnel.
In the higher education arena, prioritizing disaster recovery plans to protect vast information systems and make certain that data flow remains uninterrupted has become paramount. For a college to maintain continuity, every aspect of a campus’ primary workload, as well as all of its data, must be replicated, stored at another site, and periodically tested to make sure there is an ongoing transfer of data. This all must be achieved in the most cost-effective manner, while not disrupting the ability to provide student services.
While some larger universities can ensure that their data flow remains uninterrupted by creating multiple sites where they can mirror the original data, many higher education institutions don’t have the budget and resources to achieve this – until now.
Cloud-enabling solutions like NetApp Cloud Volumes ONTAP®, removes the need for a physical storage site. In addition, the solution provides data compression and de-duplication, which can reduce a college’s data storage space by as much as 70 percent.
In addition to freeing up IT staff time, this solution also brings enterprise-grade data management features to the cloud like snapshots, vaults, replication, encryption, caching, automated tiering — features that NetApp customers have grown to expect in their on-premises data centers.
For example, Hudson Valley Community College, in Troy, NY, is augmenting its disaster recovery plan with NetApp Cloud Volumes ONTAP®, which not only makes its data and operations more secure and streamlined, but also helps the college to simplify the management of its valuable information.
“What’s beautiful about it is that we can place it between the two physical sites and it gives us more data security,” said William Jojo, senior systems and network specialist at Hudson Valley Community College. “It also saves us the worry of replacing hardware, or of having a maintenance plan. When you move data to the cloud, you don’t have to worry about all that. The company running the cloud takes care of the gear and the environment.”
To learn more about how higher education institutions can leverage the cloud for disaster recovery, download this Disaster Recovery Guide from NetApp and Tech Data Corporation, titled, “To Avoid Data Loss, Look Towards the Cloud – NetApp Cloud-Based Disaster Recover Solution Protects Colleges from Calamity.”
