Field Reports: Why a school district switched from Barracuda Networks to eliminate bottlenecks

Summit Hill School District 161 is a forward-thinking school district catering to a rapidly-growing population in Illinois. In this edition of Field Reports, we take a close look at why this growing district chose OpenDNS Enterprise Web filtering and malware protection to secure the networks used by nearly 4,000 students and staff members.
Before discovering OpenDNS Enterprise, the technology team at SHSD 161 was using a Barracuda Networks Web filtering solution. However, the product could not accommodate the growing demand in Web traffic that SHSD 161 was seeing and it increasingly created bottlenecks. When the SHSD 161 team looked to Barracuda Networks for a replacement solution, they learned that the price had skyrocketed.
The team searched exhaustively for a new solution, and ultimately determined OpenDNS Enterprise to be the best choice for protecting their seven schools and administrative office. Why? The team tells us OpenDNS Enterprise is, “the easiest to deploy, lowest total cost of ownership overall, with no network bottlenecks due to changes in traffic demand, and high reliability.”
SHSD 161 operates a defense-in-depth security strategy, so because OpenDNS Enterprise delivers an Internet-wide security solution that also adds a layer of malware protection, it gives SHSD 161 significant additional value.
The SHSD 161 team says, “We would definitely recommend OpenDNS Enterprise. It’s a slam-dunk: easy to set up, configure and manage, and allows you to make the changes fast and get on with your day. 

We have 100 percent coverage and zero problems!”