​NREN Development and Support

NREN Support

GÉANT provides dedicated Partner support to ensure that GÉANT’s NREN partners and their user base (be they institutions, projects, researchers or students) receive the maximum possible benefit from the GÉANT project. The Partner Relations team works as a “go-between” for the NREN partners and the GÉANT project, to facilitate communication and ensure that NREN requirements are met by GÉANT services in terms of service offerings, specification and delivery.

Support to NRENs includes:

• regular dialogue to develop and maintain a pan-European knowledge of NRENs and their communities
• working closely with NREN partners to encourage service take-up and ensure effective service delivery on the GÉANT backbone
• helping to address the complex and sometimes conflicting requirements of NRENs, reflecting Europe’s digital divide and the differing circumstances of the GN3plus partner organisations.

NREN Development

Despite the positive impact of successive GÉANT initiatives, the digital divide remains a real issue for many NRENs in Southern and Eastern Europe.

There are still significant differences in terms of levels of networking infrastructure and knowledge across the 43 GN3plus participating NRENs.

NRENs in the lesser-developed European communities may need more assistance to promote and facilitate the uptake of GÉANT services, to support specific user applications (e.g. in education and health) and to provide training and practical experience for NREN staff.

The GÉANT project has a team devoted to assisting those NRENs in need of this type of help, and the work covers the following:

• provision of tailor-made support and training for NRENs in developing economies
• working to minimise the causes and effects of the digital divide in disadvantaged areas of Europe
• organising training and development workshops targeted at improving organisational, technical, financial and operational knowledge
• promoting and supporting the adoption of appropriate GÉANT services (including but not limited to eduroam, eduGAIN and perfSONAR)
• facilitating exchange of best practice and expertise across the GÉANT consortium by brokering staff secondments between NRENs.