As College Preparatory Middle School prepared to move from a church basement into its own brand-new building this year, administrators looked at every aspect of technology.

“We connected with some very knowledgeable IT people who knew how schools could benefit from technology, and how to plan for both present and future needs,” says Mitchell Miller, director of school operations at College Prep, located in the San Diego suburb of Spring Valley.

In 2018, U.S. school districts spent more than $98 billion on education construction projects, according to the U.S. Census Bureau, and 55 percent of K–12 districts had construction projects on the books in 2019. New construction creates a unique opportunity for school districts to include robust IT capabilities from the ground up. Many will seize this chance to implement connectivity, security and classroom solutions designed to last for the long haul.