In 2018, the University of Limpopo began revamping its enterprise architecture, ushering its ailing IT infrastructure into a new world of efficiency. In 2020, this digital transformation journey accelerated towards the cloud as a more scalable, agile, and reliable solution that could ensure learning continued even in the most remote and locked down circumstances.
“This project was very important to education in this country. We are building a modern ICT infrastructure that allows us to grow and service more ambitious young South Africans than we ever could before. As more users demanded access to our online, media-rich learning experience, the pressure on our back-end systems exploded. We recognised the need for cloud-based infrastructure and factored it into our roadmap for the future” Said says Tshililo Ramovha, University of Limpopo spokesperson.
“It was very important for the university to choose the right organisation to collaborate with and with AWS we had the right advice and felt comforted by the fact that they are deeply committed to our mission – to provide better education for our country.” Adds Ramovha
Having already had a few years to lay down some supporting cloud-friendly infrastructure, Tshililo Ramovha says the university proudly became one of the first public learning institutions in the country to embark on a cloud migration on this scale – heralding a sign of things to come for the sector.
AWS has spent the last two decades deepening its presence in South Africa with a particular focus on transforming education.
The multinational cloud services provider has enabled many universities, such as Wits (the University of the Witwatersrand), Limpopo, Pretoria, North West, Free State, and other institutions of higher learning to provide online learning and embrace a new cloud-driven future of education.
According to Max Makgoale, what makes cloud so essential for modern education institutions is its ability to provide access at an affordable cost.
“With cloud tech, we can finally imagine a situation where every ambitious, young South African, no matter who they are or where they come from, has equal access to quality education without putting extra strain on our learning institutions. That is the power of the cloud”
As one of the first universities to embark on this journey, the first major step for the University of Limpopo was to deploy its learning management system (LMS) Blackboard onto the cloud to meet the significantly increased demand generated by the pandemic – a task the institution’s on-prem infrastructure was simply not capable of.
From that point on, Ramovha says the University has been freed from the hassles that come with back-end management.
“Cloud didn’t just give us the ability to continue our academic curriculums, it has elevated our ability to educate no matter what unprecedented or unpredictable disasters may strike in the future.”
