By Adamarie Tait
Correspondent
Due to a major Amazon Web Services outage on Oct. 20, many websites that students use at the College, such as Amazon, Zoom and Canvas, were out of order.
The website's shutdown took place beginning at 3 a.m. Monday and persisted until 6:01 p.m., when it was resolved.
The College’s information technology department sent out a campus-wide email about the issue just before it was resolved. The email said access to Canvas was unavailable and could impact deadlines. The IT department said it was monitoring the issue and referred students to a website where they could also track the issue.
Many professors moved due dates around because of the shutdown, but a number of students say they still experienced anxiety and stress about being unable to access assignments.
Amaya Zarrillia, a sophomore elementary education and English major, told The Signal that one of her midterms was pushed back. She was able to study because she printed out a copy of the study guide ahead of time. However, Zarrillia said, “The only thing I was stressed about was that the multiple choice section was only available on Canvas.”
Sofia Sorvino, a sophomore mechanical engineering major, said she noticed around 11:30 a.m. that Canvas was down. She originally thought it was a wifi issue, but when she attempted to load Canvas on her phone she had no luck.
Sorivino wanted to know if anyone else was experiencing this, so she went on the social media platform Fizz. Students at the College can communicate with each other anonymously on Fizz. She posted the question, “Is Canvas down for any of you guys?” Which received 249 upvotes, which Sorivino interpreted as agreement from other students.
According to Sorivino, the services Peason and Mylab were down, often used for physics assignments at the College.
“The Pearson website was working, but the moment you tried to access the Mylab section, it just didn't work. It was like nothing … so I was out of luck because I was like I can't do both of these things. Like, this is ridiculous.”
Sorvino also mentioned that even though WebAssign, an online instructional system that provides homework, tests and other educational tools, wasn’t directly affected by the AWS outage, it is much easier to access the site through Canvas, so getting onto this site was a challenge as well. Sorvino said that after this situation, she had the realization of how many things are run by Amazon.
College students weren’t the only ones affected by the AWS shutdown. The outage also affected travel. Delta and United Airlines had issues with their online check-in systems, and ridesharing apps such as Lyft were down as well.
The outage also affected people financially, since Venmo and banking apps were reportedly down. Even apps involving safety, such as Life360, and those corresponding with Ring and Blink devices for home security, experienced disruptions as well.
