For a technology director, a 3 a.m. intruder alert is the stuff of nightmares, especially when you’re hours away from your district at a technical conference. This was the reality for newly appointed Tech Director Kyle Cornett of South Harrison R2. As a “one-man show” responsible for six buildings and nearly 800 students, Kyle had inherited a network with a firewall so outdated it no longer received patches—a vulnerability he had not yet been made aware of due to a communication breakdown during a leadership transition.
A Lounge Turned Command Center
The vulnerability became real during MOREnet’s Annual Conference. While Kyle was away, a security alert went off in the middle of the night. A teacher’s device—carrying malware that had sat dormant for years—had suddenly woken up, making it look like a physical intruder was in the building.
“I walked downstairs for breakfast, and I found my Member Service Advisor, Ginger, and I said, ‘I think we just had an attack at school. I’m not there, what can we do?’” The response was a masterclass in membership value. “Within probably 10 minutes, there were 15 people down there in the lounge helping me try to figure out what had happened,” Kyle said. While some were in the room, others were remotely analyzing DNS and network traffic to ensure the threat was contained.
Finding a Fast Solution
The immediate crisis was averted, but the underlying problem remained: an ancient firewall that couldn’t protect the district. Knowing the device was “plum out of date”, the MOREnet team went to work.
“The team at the Annual Conference was awesome. They loaned us a FortiGate… and said, ‘Here, borrow this until you can purchase a new one or find a different solution,’” Kyle said. But they didn’t just hand him the hardware and walk away. “They even spent hours on a Zoom call to help implement the new FortiGate once I was back at our school. It was just amazing, the help I received just by asking.”
Bridging the Communication Gap
For a new tech director, convincing a school board to spend thousands of dollars on invisible infrastructure can be difficult. The district’s Full Membership Service Package with MOREnet changed that dynamic. Having direct access to the highly-skilled LAN services and Cybersecurity teams, who provided professional documentation and a prioritized punch list of security needs, MOREnet gave Kyle the third-party backing he needed to secure funding for a new managed firewall solution.
“It made my job easier… being able to hand that to them and say, ‘This is why I need funding for a firewall. This does not meet Missouri standards.’ It’s not just the new guy crying wolf. It’s having the backing of somebody that everyone recognizes.”
The Value of Not Being Alone
In a rural district, the IT department is often just one person wearing a dozen hats, Kyle notes, from grant writing to fixing Chromebook keyboards that students accidentally switched to Spanish. Kyle describes his job, “If it’s technology-based in any way, shape, or form, I take care of it. The whole nine yards—network, implementation, AI training, almost everything”. Aside from one part-time administrative support staff, the technical weight of the district rests entirely on his shoulders.
“One-man tech teams are kind of isolated,” Kyle admitted. “I wish there were four of me. But having [MOREnet] taking care of our firewall among other solutions is something I don’t have to worry about. It is fantastic.”
In addition to the MOREnet support, he noted his appreciation for the community gained from MOREnet. He’s transitioned from being a solitary army of one into having a statewide circle of peers who understand the specific headaches of school IT. Whether it’s troubleshooting a niche hardware bug on the technical listserv hosted by MOREnet in five minutes or trading implementation secrets over a lunch table at MOREnet’s Annual Conference, Kyle now has a shared brain trust at his disposal. Kyle believes the MOREnet community transforms every challenge from a solo struggle into a collaborative fix, ensuring that no tech director in a small district has to “beat their head against the wall” alone.
For Kyle, the MOREnet membership service package and Internet Connectivity isn’t just about a high-speed connection; it’s the extension of his local team. It’s the peace of mind that comes from knowing that no matter how complex the challenge is, there is always an expert team (whether physical or virtual) ready to pull up a chair and find a way forward.