After a several-year hiatus due to the global pandemic, one of our favorite pastimes came to fold by teaching at this year's #WLPC "Wireless LAN Professionals Conference" in Phoenix. Prior to COVID, our instructors traveled as much as 45 weeks a year around the world to deliver Instructor-Led courses to our clients in public and private events, and of course conferences. Since COVID, as many of you know, our team focused on growing our new digital business unit building all original courses around real-world skills which has been incredible, and the feedback to our program has been incredible. We have maintained our relationships, built new ones, and continued delivering courses online via HD Telepresence. But there was something missing wasn't there? There was the fun of being together, the laughs, the hugs, the jokes, the triumphs, and the failures that all come at a moment's notice at a tech conference, and not just any tech conference. The #WLPC.  In short, it had been several years since we had taught at the WLPC, or any tech conference, and everyone couldn't have been more eager to get back to blowing up the status quo. 

We were so excited to see people were finally getting back together in person, we decided to do a #WiFiHappyHour / #WiFiMeetup on Monday night and brought a band all the way from #Texas #TheCastAways to provide some great entertainment with an acoustic performance. The show went well, over 200 attended and got busy connecting with people they haven’t seen in, well YEARS! WLPC was great about respecting social distancing with color bands to wear to show your comfort level with space, and social distance. Green, you're okay with handshakes, and hugs, blue is to respect people's boundaries. Simple and effective, and kept the community comfortable.

Chris Avants @RockstarWiFi and Rasika Nayanajith @mrncciew both tag-teamed taught the new Cisco 9800 Rockstar ILT to a sold-out course with great students ready for a challenge;) A brand new course, with brand new labs, and a brand-new workbook, and by day 3 everyone had found a new love for the 9800 platform and are on their way to Rockstar status with it. 

Funny no matter how much you prepare, when you write a new course, especially a new ILT, build new labs, and a new workbook, it’s going to be fun the first time you run the course. According to Chris he and Rasika debated a long time about doing a first-run course at WLPC. “In a way you want things to be perfect for everyone there. In another way, part of becoming a great engineer is seeing issues, understanding them, and learning how to fix them. The makeup of the classes we do at WLPC typically have a LOT of experience between them and advanced certifications also. At a minimum, if they are here, they typically have a real good grasp on WiFi, and it’s not uncommon to have several other CWNEs / CCIEs or CCNP’s in the class at these events. “

John Moen from our team flew from Oslo, Norway to run the #CWDP course to a great reception as well and made sure everyone also got a copy of our Wireless Workbook for Design & CWDP as a special bonus.

We decided to beef up our swag this year with a fresh design for our accessory bag a much better sticker, and an All-Access Pass promo for IT Teams and Individuals for the #WLPC Attendee and the ability to get the same promo for up to 10 of their colleagues! This is a big deal, as we don’t discount the All-Access Pass product, other than for super special events like this so you can keep learning new skills year-round! If you didn’t inspect your welcome bag enough, BE SURE YOU DO! Look for this ALL-ACCESS Pass, and especially its little brother on the same lanyard.

Oh, and we decided to launch our new WiFiTraining.com at the event as well! Although it doesn’t have all the new features we have been working on, it’s a major upgrade to what we had, and will make the student experience SO MUCH better today, and long term!

Students in our ILTs all receive “special swag” this year WiFi Training / Nike Hats and new design T-Shirts.

The number of new products announced, and upgrades announced was incredible this year. It’s clear we have all been hard at work despite the pandemic! There are literally too many to list but look forward to getting to wrap our hands on the new tech and educating the world's best clients on it.

If you haven’t been to a #WLPC conference in a while, it’s an incredible event to get back to after the craziness we have all had to deal with. Also, we have heard the #EU event will also happen later this year if you can make it to Europe!

Until then the team says they will be going to #CiscoLive events in the US, Australia, and EU. Stay tuned to this new blog for updates, we would love to see you at any of these events if you’re going as well.

If you have never been to a #WLPC, be sure to plan early next year. You can’t go wrong and take an incredible class from some of the top instructors in the world there, you learn from leaders in the community throughout the entire conference in the class, in the event halls, in the deep-dive sessions, and even on the breaks and at dinner. It’s a unique learning experience altogether and our team has loved being a part of them.

Here are a few more pictures from the event.

NOTE – I chose pictures here at RANDOM, as every one of our guy’s turned in 100’s WLPC pictures, and there’s no way I can get all of them posted.

We will definitely have to create an Instagram post with everyone's pictures because there are so many great shot's. Stay tuned for that. 

Special thanks to Keith Parsons for bringing us all together, Furney, Matt, Sam, Tauni, and all the other supporters as well.