Bresnan Business Services, a division of Bresnan Communications, has inked a five-year deal with Billings Public Schools Trustees in Montana to provide an IP-hosted phone service.
Bresnan said the service will provide Billings Public Schools a network-based “smart” telecommunications system with centralized intelligence that will allow the 
school district to integrate multiple locations onto a unified communications platform that is customizable down to the dialing plan.
The school district in Billings services 15,500 students, and Bresnan’s master headend is located in the city of Billings.
Bresnan Business Services said its platform provides for ongoing system upgrades and unlimited growth, which in turn provides a service that is constantly and seamlessly up to date with the most current technologies.
Bresnan’s IP hosted phone service will ride over the top of Billings Public Schools’ fiber optic wide area network, which is also provided by Bresnan. The new contract will start on July 1 and will allow the Billings Public Schools to maximize the full benefits of the Federal E-rate program.
“After identifying our needs, a move to Bresnan’s Hosted IP phone service made perfect sense for our district,” said Karen Palmer, the district’s director of technology. “We love the ability to centrally manage the system through an easy, elegant, Web-based interface, and our users love the flexibility and features this system provides.”
The Federal E-Rate program is funded by the Universal Services Fund, which is administered by the Federal Communications Commission. The purpose of the program is to ensure that schools and libraries across the country receive state-of-the-art telecom services.
Bresnan Communications, a broadband telecommunications company founded by Bill Bresnan in 1984, serves more than 320,000 customers throughout Colorado, Montana, Wyoming and Utah. Comcast is among the companies that have a stake in Bresnan Communications.
