In This Issue
Upcoming events
- WVNET Offices Closed – Labor Day
- Banner & Degree Works Office Hours – Tuesdays at 11:00 AM
- Brightspace Office Hours – Tuesdays at 1:00 PM
- Web Wednesdays – Web Support Office Hours – Wednesdays at 1:00 PM
- West Virginia Statewide Technology Conference (WVSTC) –
October 15-16, 2025 – Oglebay Resort
Executive Director’s Note
As classrooms across West Virginia come alive with the energy of a new academic year, West Virginia Network (WVNET) proudly welcomes back students, educators, and administrators from both K–12 schools and higher education institutions. Whether you’re starting kindergarten or heading into your final year of college, this is a time of fresh beginnings, renewed goals, and exciting possibilities.
Over the summer, WVNET worked diligently to enhance the digital infrastructure by incorporating new equipment and faster connectivity to our network. The Telecommunication section of this newsletter has a great explanation on all the hard work performed. A big thank-you to all our customers for their patience and support while we made these much-needed upgrades happen!
Looking ahead, we’re focused on using technology to bring people together, spark new ideas, and open up more opportunities for learning. One great way to stay inspired is by joining us at our upcoming technology conference—it’s a chance to connect with others, explore new tools, and get ready for the year ahead.
So here’s to a safe, successful, and well-connected school year. Welcome back—we’re glad you’re here!
West Virginia Statewide Technology Conference Update
Earn College Graduate Credit Hours at the WVSTC
We are delighted to announce that the 2025 WVSTC is able to offer attendees college graduate credit hours in Education and Business through our partners at West Liberty University. If you are interested in learning more about how to earn these credit hours to apply to your certification, fill out this interest form.
If you have any questions, please contact us!
About the Moby Award
The Moby Award represents a powerful testament to workplace collaboration and mutual appreciation, where employees have the opportunity to nominate and celebrate their colleagues’ outstanding contributions. Unlike traditional top-down recognition programs, this award empowers team members to directly acknowledge the hard work, innovative thinking, and exceptional performance of their peers. By allowing employees to highlight and honor the achievements of those they work alongside daily, the award fosters a culture of genuine respect, encouragement, and collective achievement within the organization.
Moby Winners 2025
August 2025 – Rebecca Clise to Erin Grondalski
July 2025 – Kim Jenkins to Rebecca Clise
(June 2025 – no all staff meeting)
May 2025 – Anita Davis to Kim Jenkins
April 2025 – Steve White to Anita Davis
March 2025 – Phil Snitz to Steve White
February 2025 – Mike McDonald and JR Farley to Phil Snitz & Team
(January 2025 – no all staff meeting)
Department Updates
Human Resources
JOIN OUR TEAM: Network Operator – Morgantown
WVNET is seeking to hire a full-time Network Operator to provide critical Tier I support and consulting to a wide range of customers, including K-12 schools, higher education institutions, libraries, state and county agencies, and non-profit organizations. Starting salary: $38,410 plus comprehensive benefits including health/dental/vision insurance, HSA/FSA options, retirement plans, life/disability coverage, and generous paid-time-off, including annual (vacation), sick leave, and state/federal holidays. This is an excellent opportunity for someone looking to build a career in network operations while making a real impact on communities across our state.
Ready to Apply?
Visit Careers at WVNET – West Virginia Network (WVNET) for complete job details, qualifications, and to submit your application.
Business and Finance
The business office is currently in the midst of our annual financial audit, which has made for a particularly busy season. As part of our regular cycle, we’ve successfully renewed several key contracts—including those for Microsoft and SignNow licenses—and have begun issuing invoices for Fiscal Year 2026.
Late summer and early fall are traditionally high-activity periods for our team, and this year is no exception. We appreciate your patience and cooperation as we work through these important processes to keep everything running smoothly.
We are also examining our processes for additional efficiencies in order to best serve our clients going forward.
Client Services
Distance Learning
Monthly Brightspace Updates – Summer 2025 Edition
Stay up to date with the latest enhancements in Brightspace that are designed to improve course management, learner experience, and data analytics. Here’s what’s new from June through August:
June 2025 – Introducing the New Courses Tool
The new Courses tool is now live in production environments, offering a more streamlined and accessible experience for course creation, copying, and searching. This tool features:
- A consistent layout and workflow aligned with Classlist, Quizzes, and Users tools.
- Modern search filters for easier course discovery.
- Simplified course creation with required fields like Name and Code.
- Direct navigation to the Course Homepage or Course Admin page.
To ensure continuity, updated configuration variables have been introduced to match the functionality of the legacy Course Management tool, which previously offered limited search capabilities and a less consistent interface.
July 2025 – Enhanced Learner Progress Tracking
Learners using the New Content Experience can now better track their progress within modules. Key updates include:
- ✅ Check marks for completed content topics.
- 📊 Fractional progress summaries for each module.
- 📅 Streamlined due date display with tooltips for additional details.
These enhancements make it easier for learners to identify what’s completed and what’s still pending, supporting better time management and engagement.
August 2025 – Brightspace Data Sets (BDS) Version Update
In alignment with Brightspace’s change management policy, BDS Major Version 9 is no longer supported in Analytics Builder. The WVNET Brightspace Administration team will handle the transition to BDS Major Version 10, including updates to custom datasets and analyses.
Once the full dataset run completes in Data Hub, Version 10 will be pulled into Analytics Builder. While content mapped to Version 9 will still function, it will no longer receive updates and may contain outdated data.
📢 LIVE Brightspace User Group Meeting
Don’t miss our upcoming Brightspace User Group Meeting, where we’ll dive deeper into these updates, share best practices, and answer your questions. Stay tuned for the meeting invite! Members of the D2L team will be joining us at Oglebay in October. Don’t miss your chance to be part of this live event. Register now at 2025 West Virginia Statewide Technology Conference.
Banner & Degree Works
Connect with WVNET’s Banner / Degree Works Experts
It’s easy to get in touch – we’re here to help.
Whether it’s helping with troubleshooting an issue, talking through a challenge, or searching for Ellucian product documentation, we have made it easy to connect and find the answers you are looking for. We have several ways to get in touch with us.
Note, if it’s urgent, you can always call the WVNET Help Desk – phone: 304-293-5192 (Select Option 1).
- Log in / Sign Up to the OZ problem ticket system – OZ is a comprehensive problem tracking system that turns chaos into clarity. You can create, track, manage, issues at your organization from first report to completion. You can log in or sign up at: WVNET -OZ- Problem Tracking System.
- Tuesday Office Hours – held online every Tuesday at 11am ET. It’s your opportunity to ask questions of the Banner / Degree Works experts in a casual environment. There is no need to register in advance. See you there.
- WVNET BUG Listserv* – The Banner User Group listserv is a dedicated space for year‑round collaboration regarding Ellucian products. You can connect with other institutions, swap tips, and solve Banner/Degree Works challenges together. Plus, as a bonus, we host a monthly virtual session.
- WVNET Degree Works Listserv* – This listserv is a great place for sharing ideas with your Degree Works colleagues as well as receiving news about upcoming patches or upgrades about the product.
For more information about the teams, check out the Banner Support & Training and Degree Works Support & Training sections of the WVNET website.
* To sign up for the BUG (Banner) or Degree Works listserv, please send an email to blong@staff.wvnet.edu.
Development Team Updates
Supporting Community Organizations: The Morgantown Newcomers Website
When the Morgantown Community Newcomers Club needed to modernize their aging website, they worked with the freelance developer who had originally built their site back in 2013. The website needed a complete overhaul— some of the plugins it relied on were no longer actively supported, the club needed updated tools to handle memberships, and online communications for their growing community of members.
The developer worked on updating the WordPress-based website’s look and feel as well as its social network, event calendars, communication tools, and integrated systems for dues payments. However, as the project neared completion, she faced a common challenge many freelancers encounter: ensuring long-term support for clients while transitioning away from active freelance work.
That’s where WVNET stepped in. Recognizing the importance of reliable, ongoing support for community organizations, our Development team took over the project to handle final bug fixes, testing, and launch. WVNET will continue to provide the long-term technical support that the Morgantown Newcomers Club needs going forward.
The transition has worked seamlessly. We completed the site launch and now provide ongoing hosting, technical support, and consulting services to keep the platform running smoothly.
This partnership highlights how WVNET supports West Virginia’s public and non-profit organizations. Through our consulting services and weekly Wednesday office hours, we help our customers navigate website management challenges. Whether it’s troubleshooting WordPress issues, planning new features, or simply answering questions about best practices, we’re here to ensure that technology serves these organizations rather than creating additional burdens.
For the Morgantown Newcomers Club, this support means their community can continue growing and evolving, backed by reliable technical expertise when they need it.
You can visit the Morgantown Community Newcomers Club online at https://morgantownnewcomers.org
To find out more about WVNET’s Development Team and our Web Wednesdays Open Office Hours, contact WVNET-Support@staff.wvnet.edu. Read more about the Development Team here: WVNET – Development.
TELECOM UPDATE
WVNET Upgrades Network Infrastructure for Greater Reliability and Performance
WVNET recently completed a major network upgrade to address long-standing limitations in capacity and redundancy. Previously, hardware constraints and limited fiber diversity in West Virginia led to outages when fiber breaks occurred.
To resolve these issues, WVNET deployed new routers at four key locations, partnering with DQE Communications and OARnet to establish high-bandwidth, physically diverse circuits. This redesigned transit ring allows data to flow in both directions and recover quickly from disruptions using modern protocols.
After 19 months of planning and fiber construction, the final circuit was activated in July 2025. Over the weekend of July 18, WVNET successfully migrated all traffic to the new infrastructure, requiring a brief planned outage for hardware reconfiguration and BGP setup.
What does this mean for WVNET customers:
- Improved path diversity to reduce network interruptions caused by a single point.
- Overall higher bandwidth capabilities that are easier to scale to meet needs.
- Lower latency resulting in improved performance.
This marks the first phase of WVNET’s broader modernization initiative, which includes new backbone equipment, firewalls, VPN servers, and switches in Charleston and Morgantown—ensuring our customers are equipped for innovation and growth
Systems Update
As our infrastructure continues to evolve, we’re embracing technologies that enhance reliability, performance, and flexibility. A key part of this transformation is our ongoing migration to the Nutanix hypervisor, which provides a resilient and scalable foundation for delivering our services.
We’re also upgrading the remaining components of our environment to ensure stronger security and seamless compatibility with modern tools.
To support these changes, we’ve introduced new observability solutions that give us deeper insights into our operations:
Grafana Loki: Our new log aggregation tool centralizes logs from across our systems, allowing us to visualize traffic patterns, query system data, and troubleshoot issues more efficiently.
CheckMK: This advanced IT monitoring platform offers comprehensive visibility into system health, including CPU usage, disk performance, and more. It enables proactive issue detection and faster response times.
We have also deployed Grafana Loki log aggregation, centralizing logs from across our systems. This allows us to visualize and query information from our systems to create a better understanding of daily traffic trends, and empowers admins to quickly troubleshoot issues and reduce resolution time.
Together, these upgrades strengthen the stability of our infrastructure and ensure that we are well positioned for the future.
WVNET Staff Suggested Reads
In this issue, Supervisor of Development, Sarah Barnes, recommends “Salt: A World History” by Mark Kurlansky
“Salt” traces how this simple mineral shaped civilizations, triggered wars, and drove exploration for millennia. From ancient Chinese salt monopolies to the American Revolution’s salt shortages, Kurlansky reveals how salt preservation revolutionized food storage, enabled long sea voyages, and became so valuable it was literally worth its weight in gold. The book weaves together fascinating stories of how salt influenced everything from Roman soldier wages (the origin of “salary”) to Gandhi’s independence movement, showing how this everyday seasoning was actually one of history’s most crucial commodities. This book is a surprisingly engaging read and will entertain anyone who has an interest in history.
How are we doing?
Your satisfaction is very important to us. WVNET has implemented a customer satisfaction survey link in our OZ ticketing system. When a help ticket is closed, the reporter will receive an email update with a link to allow customers to fill out the survey, and, if desired, request a call from a manager. To access the form in the OZ email, click on the link.
If you’re not using OZ and you wish to take the survey, please feel free to complete the survey at https://wvnet.edu/satisfaction-survey/. We look forward to hearing from you. Have questions? Contact Harmony Garletts at hgarletts@staff.wvnet.edu.