a) Wide Area Network Access must provide a fully meshed connection to every school and administrative office. b) Medium for the Wide Area Network is currently over leased lit Metro Ethernet and/or fiber optic to every location. This physical hand-off from the DMARC at each site’s routing switch is the preferred connection medium by Gaston County Schools. Gaston County Schools reserves the right to identify the location of the DMARC and physical handoff. Any moves from present locations will be at cost to the provider. c) Responder’s equipment requirements must adhere to the specifications of existing equipment. Any necessary changes will be at cost to the provider. d) Responder’s equipment must have dual power supplies in locations with the designation of DC1 or DC2. e) The Responder must have a presence in all service areas and municipalities in Gaston County. Multiple provider agreements are not preferred, nor vendors contracting with other vendors for rights of way or services. f) Latency shall not be any more than 10 milliseconds RTT (round-trip time) between circuits. g) The Wide Area Network must remain isolated from traffic on the other service provider networks. h) The Wide Area Network provider must have an uptime greater than 99%. i) The Wide Area Network provider shall have no greater than a 4 hour on-site response time 24/7. j) The Wide Area Network provider’s replacement equipment shall be accessible for the customer within the same business day. k) The Wide Area Network provider must be located in the Charlotte, North Carolina region. l) Gaston County Schools will maintain and configure all Wide Area Network equipment on the Wide Area Network including but not limited to all routing, switching, NAT, firewall, and VLANS.
