Indianapolis Public Schools Makes the Big Leap to the Cloud

“One of our goals with Rebuilding Stronger is to support students with the best technology available,” Allen says. “However, it was clear we could not continue to rely on an outdated infrastructure that caused significant limitations.”

“Unable to support the latest security updates, the old data center left us open to security threats, while its storage mechanisms lacked flexibility to scale up in a cost-efficient manner,” she adds.

Indianapolis Leaders Review the District’s Data Center Options

The district planned to tap its portion of the Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief Fund to help finance new investments, but time was running out for individual departments to earmark those dollars for specific projects. As Allen and her colleagues considered what it would take to pick up and move their data center to a new place, they also weighed that against another option — migrating most of their servers to the cloud.

“For me, there were two pivotal questions: How do we improve student learning, and how do we provide sustainable, flexible, long-term support to the entire district?” Allen says. If IPS kept its data center on-premises, any upgrades, replacements and future maintenance would be entirely the district’s responsibility. 

Colocation was also a possibility. If IPS took that route, it would modernize with new hardware but would house it in a space that was managed by a third party. 

Turning to the cloud checked all the boxes for the district, Allen says, and not only because it would require less infrastructure.

“The final decision to move to Microsoft Azure came down to fulfilling our overall goal, which was to reduce the burden on our IT team and open opportunities and possibilities while remaining fiscally sound.”

IPS leaders also saw the move as an opportunity to reimagine traditional learning models and explore innovation across the district. 

“With the ever-changing landscape of American education to consider, this migration provides us much-needed computing power and storage,” Allen says. “It allows us to provide solutions that capture the profound impact modern technology can have on education.”

READ MORE: Schools benefit from multicloud computing. 

What’s Behind the Trend of More K–12 Schools Moving to the Cloud?

The same factors that led IPS to the cloud are causing other school districts across the country to re-evaluate their reliance on in-house data centers. According to a 2024 survey by the Consortium for School Networking, 35% of school districts are working on cloud initiatives.

“My sense is that this is something K–12 organizations are doing regularly for a couple of reasons,” says Amy McLaughlin, director of CoSN’s Network and Systems Design Initiative. 

First, there can be budgetary benefits to embracing cloud-based servers and services. When tasked with operating an on-premises environment, districts sometimes struggle with the capital expenses associated with replacing aging or broken hardware, McLaughlin explains. The cloud model, on the other hand, comes with better financial predictability: “You have a monthly flat fee, so you know what it’s going to cost, and your equipment is always up to date.”

Moving to the cloud can likewise ensure that districts pay only for what they need, says McLaughlin, who is also executive director of technical and solutions architecture at Oregon State University. Districts can scale their data centers up or down to match demand from their school communities, and their technology teams can devote more time to tasks unrelated to onsite infrastructure.  

“When you don’t have to deal with maintenance, you can refocus on areas such as supporting teachers and students in the classroom,” she says.

DIVE DEEPER: Cloud computing drives change in K–12 schools.

Planning Is Key to a Successful Cloud Migration in Indianapolis

At IPS, Allen says, nearly 95% of district applications are now hosted in the cloud. The district worked with CDW to facilitate the move to Azure, completing the work in phases, starting with a migration readiness assessment.

“This strategic, well-thought-out plan was climacteric,” Allen says. “Without this plan, it would have been impossible to ensure each decision we made aligned with the district’s mission. It also provided us with a granular view, which allows us to be proactive and address possible challenges as we moved forward.” 

Logistical planning was also vital for a smooth transition, especially when moving sensitive student information and institutional data from aging hardware. 

Application performance tests were critical. One challenge, for example, had to do with application dependencies. If a program used by the district’s HR team was dependent on an app in the finance department, both departments had to either move to the cloud together or remain on-premises. 

The final phase of the project was the migration itself. Following nearly two years of preparation, teamwork and partnership, the shift began in the summer of 2024 and was completed by the time students returned to school in the fall.

DISCOVER: Get the most out of a cloud assessment.

Allen says moving to the district’s new home in the cloud serves as a foundation to carry out the superintendent’s vision. The classroom impact is already clear: IPS teachers now have access to resources that allow them to better personalize learning, classes can be held anywhere that laptops can go, and instructors can now supplement their in-person lessons with virtual coursework.

“The biggest payoff from the move is that we are far more agile,” Allen says. “The cloud brings significant benefits that allow us to meet our district’s ever-evolving needs. During this short span, we have already improved our adaptability and responsiveness to change. I believe we will be reaping the benefits of this move for many years to come.”