Poplar Grove, Illinois, is a rural community 83 miles northwest of downtown Chicago and home to the North Boone School District. Its location is ideal for families who are looking for the advantages of small-town living yet having the convenience of access to the big city.

Proudly called on the township’s website “a great place to call home,” Poplar Grove offers a variety of residential lifestyle opportunities, including six schools that serve 1,700 students.

The district, which sits “in the middle of cornfields,” according to Jerry Rudolph, instructional technology coordinator, is progressive and takes advantage of an E-rate government program that subsidizes the cost of the schools’ wireless service.

But to make sure they had access to the right service at the right price, the district had to evaluate all wireless options. Although previously with Verizon, the district determined that Sprint had the best coverage and service for the schools, so they recently made the switch.

Although cost was also a deciding factor for moving to Sprint, Rudolph said the district wanted to take advantage of Sprint’s network and unlimited plans. To complete the deal, Sprint arranged for a Sprint Magic Box near the main entrance at each school to ensure the highest level of 4G LTE data service.

And Sprint Magic Box has made a notable difference, Rudolph said. Before Sprint Magic Box, download speeds were inconsistent, often in the range of 2-3 Mbps. Now school officials report download speeds closer to 20 Mbps.

Simple, Easy-to-Use Solution

“The hardest thing about Magic Box was finding a window ledge that was wide enough for it to sit on,” Rudolph laughed. “Implementation was that easy – it’s just one piece of equipment. You plug it into power, hit ‘next’ a few times, and it’s up and running.”

Sprint Magic Box is the world’s first all-wireless small cell. Within minutes of plugging the equipment into an outlet, students and school employees have a better data experience while streaming videos, surfing the web, and using their favorite online apps and services. The technology is part of a broad toolkit of solutions to improve Sprint’s data speeds and coverage.

While Sprint designed Sprint Magic Box to be small, the company engineered it to have an expansive coverage area – one that works great across entire school buildings. One Magic Box provides average indoor coverage of 30,000 square feet under optimum conditions for most devices. The Sprint Magic Box signal also extends data coverage to Sprint customers nearby in homes and other businesses.

“I wish everyone had a Sprint Magic Box,” Rudolph said. “In fact, Sprint should just package them up with their phones – it would create a big powerful network.”

About Sprint:

Sprint (NYSE: S) is a communications services company that creates more and better ways to connect its customers to the things they care about most. Sprint served 59.7 million connections as of March 31, 2017, and is widely recognized for developing, engineering and deploying innovative technologies, including the first wireless 4G service from a national carrier in the United States; leading no-contract brands including Virgin Mobile USA, Boost Mobile, and Assurance Wireless; instant national and international push-to-talk capabilities; and a global Tier 1 Internet backbone. Sprint has been named to the Dow Jones Sustainability Index (DJSI) North America for the past five years. You can learn more and visit Sprint at www.sprint.com or www.facebook.com/sprint and www.twitter.com/sprint.