Always‑On Learning at Scale: Millfield Builds a Reliable Campus Network with Extreme

As one of the largest boarding schools in the UK, Millfield serves students ages 2-18 across a sprawling campus. From specialised academic buildings and extensive sports facilities to on-site accommodation for older students and staff, this campus has high demands for network performance and reliability. With 75% of students living on-campus and approximately 5,000 doors on site, Millfield is a primary and secondary school looks a lot more like a prestigious college.

That’s what prompted the push for a network that could meet the demands for scale and complexity that were troubling Gary Henderson, Director of IT at Millfield, and his team. From teaching and learning to living spaces and campus operations, connectivity is foundational to daily life at Millfield. As Millfield embarked on a 1:1 device journey, the struggle with the existing network became even more evident.

“Going from a hodgepodge of solutions to something that can actually support the usage and the pedagogy our teachers need — that was the challenge before us,” said Gary of the pre-Extreme network.

Millfield’s existing network struggled to keep pace with the realities of a modern boarding campus, including:

• Inconsistent wireless coverage and capacity caused by a mix of legacy access points
• Rising demand from laptops, tablets, and bandwidth‑intensive applications
• Higher device density in boarding houses and shared residential spaces
• The need to securely support multiple user groups, including students, staff, BYOD, and visitors, across a geographically spread campus

The IT team needed a scalable, easy‑to‑manage network that could deliver a consistent experience everywhere learning and living happened.

“One of the major factors in deciding to go with Extreme was that it was controllerless,” said Matt King, Senior Network Engineer at Millfield. “Each access point has its own ‘brain,’ so to speak.” To modernise the network and support growing demand, Millfield standardised on Extreme wireless and switching, enabling:

• Controllerless Wi‑Fi with centralised visibility, eliminating dedicated controllers while maintaining control through ExtremeCloud IQ
• Modernised wired edge with PoE switching to support increased access point density across campus
• A rolling refresh strategy, prioritising high‑demand areas such as academic buildings and boarding houses
• Network segmentation for security and simplicity, isolating students, staff, BYOD, guests, and campus systems

This approach also allowed security and student well‑being to be built directly into day‑to‑day network management.

“When students say the Wi-Fi isn’t working, that very often means they’re trying to access something they shouldn’t. We’re able to block that,” Gary said, describing how the team controls where the network will — and won’t — allow access.

“We certainly have less in terms of complaints now, especially in the boarding houses where connectivity was spotty before,” Gary said, reflecting on the results Millfield has experienced. And that’s only the beginning of the benefits Henderson and his team have noticed.

Since upgrading the network and rolling out Extreme’s secure, high-performance Wi-Fi where demand is highest, Millfield has seen measurable improvements, including:

• Noticeably fewer Wi‑Fi complaints, particularly in student boarding houses with high device density
• Improved performance during peak usage periods, when students shift to streaming and personal use
• Long‑term switching reliability, with no major failures disrupting operations for more than a decade
• Greater confidence in the network’s ability to scale, supporting learning, living, and campus systems across a large estate

“On the switching side, we’ve never had any major failures at all in 13 years,” Matt said of his key takeaways working with Extreme. “We’ve had no situations that took us offline for any real period of time.”

Today, the network supports far more than classrooms. It connects devices across teaching spaces, residences, sports facilities, and security systems—handling predictable evening traffic spikes when students simultaneously shift to streaming and personal use. The result is a network the team trusts to scale and adapt, year after year.