On September 8, the Saint Xavier University Campus Alert System notified community members of an Internet Outage related to AT&T, which has now been resolved.Â
At 10:55 a.m., SXU Getrave Alert informed people, “Internet Outage related to ATT. ATT has been contacted,†adding, “More information will be shared as it becomes available.â€
Molly Maley-Gaik, the Chief Information Officer of SXU’s Information Technology (IT) Department, stated in a September 13 email, “The Internet outage on Wednesday, September 8th was ultimately caused and originated by our Internet Service Provider (AT&T) stemming from a fiber-optic cable being damaged at their primary downtown Chicago ‘central office’ data center.â€
The university’s IT Department was not responsible for the Internet Outage, but worked to address the issue that caused it.
“Our IT personnel were immediately on top of this critical situation and began troubleshooting to confirm the readiness and status of our Internet equipment,†Maley-Gaik mentioned, continuing, “and were able to quickly confirm that the outage had nothing to do with power loss by any of the SXU owned or AT&T owned Internet equipment onsite and that all of our SXU equipment was functioning as designed.â€Â
Maley-Gaik noted, “We became aware of the outage right away, shortly after 10am, as the lack of Internet accessibility was apparent.â€
Maley-Gaik continued: “The outage had nothing to do with any on-campus IT device (SXU owned or AT&T owned).â€Â Â
By 2:03 p.m., another email following the previous alert was issued. “ATT has identified a cyber issue and is working to restore the internet,†also stating, “Users will be notified when restored.â€
Shortly after a cyber issue was discovered, a new alert was updated seven minutes later.
“ATT has identified a fiber issue and is working to restore the internet,†the email read at 2:11 p.m., again reminding users that they will be notified once the internet is restored.
Despite the Internet Outage and a long delay to get Internet power restored, classes were not cancelled.Â
Maley-Gaik explained, “Classes were not cancelled because a., some could continue without internet access and b., we did not know how long it would take ATT to resolve.â€
Rola Othman, Ph.D., the Director of Client Services and a representative for the Hub, said in a September 15 email, “The Hub team fielded calls all day, visited various offices and labs to troubleshoot, but all for the same source of the problem.â€
“At this point, we knew AT&T was the cause and opened a ticket with them and continued pushing and escalating them throughout the day,†Maley-Gaik said on September 13.Â
Maley-Gaik continued: “Unfortunately, the root cause of the outage took much longer than expected on the local (Chicago) AT&T side, but was eventually confirmed resolved following their fiber repair in the downtown Chicago office around 10:45p and verified immediately by SXU IT staff who was on conference bridge with AT&T throughout the evening.â€
Talia McMullen, a First-Year Art & Graphic Design student, initially thought the Internet Outage was ‘an inconvenience,’ but says it did not affect her learning and coursework for the day.Â
“I had an essay I needed to work on during my first class,†says McMullen, “but after that it wasn’t much of an inconvenience for me because I only had classes that consisted of drawing and lectures for that day.â€
Additionally, community members encountered a new problem of accessing SXU Canvas Instructure, their mySXU portal page, and myMail school email accounts.
McMullen mentions, “I did experience issues with all three actually,†further implying, “For whatever reason, I expected Canvas to still be up and running, so when I finally figured that out it was annoying.â€Â
On September 13, Maley-Gaik claimed that the outage affected ‘everyone and every system,’ which was due to the reason these issues occurred.Â
“As the link from their central office to provide us connectivity was compromised and once repaired, we were all able to access all systems,†Maley-Gaik said.Â
Although classes were not cancelled, McMullen was surprised these issues would ‘extend that far.’
“I wasn’t expecting classes to be cancelled for the day at all,†noting, “I thought it would be some type of work around or alternate assignment for the classes that used computers and such.â€
McMullen continues: “Not being able to access Canvas meant that I wasn’t able to get in contact with teachers, see or work on assignments, etc. That was definitely an inconvenience.â€
As of 11:25 p.m., SXU Alert contacted students, faculty and staff members, saying, “ATT has resolved their issue and campus connectivity has been restored,†confirming that Campus operations ‘resume as normal’ effective September 9.
“IT personnel critical to the escalation process were Brian Goebel, Executive Director of Networks/Infrastructure and his team, and Dr. Rola Othman, Director of Client Services and her team,†said Maley-Gaik.
Maley-Gaik continued: “I thank the entire IT team for remaining diligent to ensure conclusion of the outage.â€
SXU community members are encouraged to register their cell phone number and keep up to date with any/all weather and emergency-related situations on campus.
On your mySXU portal, and under Resources, users are to click “Campus-Wide Text Alert System†to receive important notifications and information on your mobile device.
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