Purpose
This is a collection of emails sent to Wave 1 in preperation for the Teams Phone migration 8/12/2025.
Intended Audience
BRCC employees with an assigned phone number.
Emails
Contents
From: John Downey <DowneyJ@brcc.edu>
Sent: Monday, July 21, 2025 4:22 PM
To: President's Office <president@brcc.edu>
Cc: Edward Pease <peasee@brcc.edu>; Jessica Bezold <BezoldJ@brcc.edu>
Subject: Phone System is moving to Microsoft Teams soon!
Members of the College Community:
As I have mentioned previously at College Assembly meetings, the VCCS will soon be implementing a common phone platform across all community colleges in Virginia. As a result, Blue Ridge Community College will be moving to Microsoft Teams within the next month. The implementation will come in two waves. The first wave will be effective on August 12, 2025. On August 12, all of our current office phones will no longer be operational, except for phones in student facing offices such as student services, financial aid, and student financial services. For everyone else, all phone calls will now take place using your computer…similar to how we do Zoom calls. As part of Wave 2, student facing offices will all transition away from phones sometime in mid-September.
Ed Pease and his staff are preparing diligently for this major transition. As part of that transition, please read carefully the following note from Jessica Bezold which further explains the rollout plan.
If you have any questions, please work with your supervisor, who will collect any questions and submit them directly to Jessica. In addition to upcoming training and demo sessions, the help desk will be ready to extend support to anyone who needs it. The technology is not difficult. As I indicated, it will be very similar to making Zoom calls, which you are all familiar with. It will take some getting used to and each of us will need to learn new Microsoft Teams settings that will help us as we learn the system.
Thanks for your patience as we work to implement this VCCS system-wide project.
__________________________________________
Good Afternoon,
We are excited to announce that the VCCS is upgrading our communications platform by integrating Microsoft Teams Calling as our new telephony system. This transition is designed to enhance your productivity, streamline collaboration, and provide you with a unified, modern communication experience.
What This Means for You
Microsoft Teams Calling will allow you to:
- Make and receive calls from anywhere: Seamlessly connect from your desktop, mobile device, or any Teams-enabled device.
- Unify communications: Manage voice calls, chats, and meetings in a single platform.
- Increase flexibility: Enjoy advanced features like voicemail transcription, call forwarding, and delegation tools.
- Enhance mobility: Transition between devices without interruption.
Key Benefits
- Global Reach: Stay connected with international calling capabilities and toll-free options.
- Advanced Analytics: Access detailed call reports to optimize communication strategies.
- Improved Support: Enjoy a secure, reliable platform supported by Microsoft’s robust infrastructure.
- Integration with Microsoft 365: Directly link calls with Outlook, OneDrive, and your favorite productivity tools.
What’s Next
- Migration Timeline: The migration will take place over the next 2 and half months, with minimal disruption to your workflow.
- Training Sessions: We are scheduling tailored sessions to help you maximize the benefits of Microsoft Teams Calling.
- Support: Our IT team and Microsoft-certified partners will be available to assist you during and after the transition.
We are confident this upgrade will elevate our communication and collaboration capabilities. If you have questions or specific needs during this transition, please don’t hesitate to reach out to myself and/or Ed Pease. Preemptive introductory information can be found in the growing knowledge base for Teams Phone within Team Dynamix.
Thank you for your continued support as we move toward this exciting innovation.
Best Regards,
Jessica
Dr. John A. Downey, President
Blue Ridge Community College
Post Office Box 80
Weyers Cave, VA 24486
(540) 453-2200
From: Benjamin Carnevale <carnevaleb@brcc.edu>
Sent: Thursday, July 31, 2025 2:12 PM
To: Benjamin Carnevale <carnevaleb@brcc.edu>
Subject: Get Ready for Teams Phone
«FirstName»,
On 8/12/2025, your work phone number «userpersontelephoneNumber» will migrate to Teams Phone. This is a big change for everyone, and we want to make sure you’re prepared.
How to Prepare:
- Read through the project announcement and FAQs
- Look through short how-to videos from Microsoft. Most are less than 1min long
- Test your audio equipment. The way you currently interact with Teams or Zoom meetings is the way you will hear and speak on calls. Schedule a quick meeting with a colleague to help each other test!
Please Ask Questions:
No matter how small, we want to hear your questions; this helps us create documentation for the college as we see a need. So we can keep track of them, please submit your questions as a ticket.
Links:
Please keep an eye out for more informational emails from me or Jessica Bezold regarding this transition.
Migrating with you,
Ben & Jessica
|
Benjamin Carnevale
Help Desk Supervisor
Blue Ridge Community College
540-453-2525
|
Jessica M. Bezold
IT Support Specialist | Accounts, Operations, & Security
Technology Services
Phone: 540.234.9261 | Ext. 602524
|
From: Benjamin Carnevale <carnevaleb@brcc.edu>
Sent: Wednesday, August 6, 2025 4:52 PM
To: Benjamin Carnevale <carnevaleb@brcc.edu>
Subject: Teams Phone: Wave-Specific Information
Importance: High
All,
Beginning Tuesday 8/12, until 9/17, BRCC departments will be communicating across two separate phone systems. We did this to ensure continuity of service with our student-facing departments during the start of the semester, and to avoid a mid-semester change for Faculty.
In the next few days, I will be sending important information directly to each of these groups regarding what to expect. Transferring students to another department will change for EVERYONE, including transferring to the Help Desk.
There will be links in my emails; they are not PHISH bait. Wave 1 has already received a direct email from me with important informational links. Please visit them to stay informed and feel ready to use your computer as a phone.
It will be hard to call the Help Desk on Tuesday if you don’t know how to use Teams Phone 😉. Dr. Downey’s original announcement with additional information from Jessica Bezold and links to documentation is attached.
Thanks,
Ben
Benjamin Carnevale
Help Desk Supervisor
Blue Ridge Community College
540-453-2525
Learn about Teams Phone: Coming 8/12
From: Benjamin Carnevale <carnevaleb@brcc.edu>
Sent: Thursday, August 7, 2025 12:38 PM
To: Benjamin Carnevale <carnevaleb@brcc.edu>
Subject: Teams Phone: You are in Wave 1
«FirstName»,
You are in «Wave». Next Tuesday, 8/12, your desk phone will no longer work for your personal work number, «Extn». You will start making and receiving phone calls via the Calls app 📞in Teams on your computer (and smartphone if installed).
If you are a regular Teams user, you’ll likely find the simple interface intuitive. I still urge you to review some of the short instructional videos for calling and voicemail basics. There are also extra features to explore for call transfers and voicemail.
If you have questions, please check the FAQs. If we haven't answered your question, please submit a ticket or reply to one of my emails so we can track what people ask.
Calling Wave 2
Student Services | Financial Aid | Call Center | Testing Center
Wave 2 will still be on the old system and will no longer be available by 60XXXX. Please read these instructions for calling and transferring from Wave 1 to Wave 2.
Informational Links
Not PHISHing you,
Ben
Benjamin Carnevale
Help Desk Supervisor
Blue Ridge Community College
540-453-2525
Learn about Teams Phone: Coming 8/12
From: Benjamin Carnevale
Sent: Monday, August 11, 2025 12:34 PM
To: Benjamin Carnevale <carnevaleb@brcc.edu>
Cc: Sara Botkin <botkins@brcc.edu>
Subject: Teams Phone: Information for New Faculty
Welcome, again!
This is your condensed Teams Phone email announcement. Please take a minute to look at the informational links below. I have also compiled all of the emails you would have received here: Teams Phone: Wave 1 Email Campaign.
Get Ready
Calling Wave 2
Student Services | Financial Aid | Call Center | Testing Center
Wave 2 will still be on the old system and must be dialed like an external number. Please read these instructions for calling and transferring from Wave 1 to Wave 2.
Ask Questions
Don’t suffer silently! If you have a question, however small, please call us at 540-453-2400.
Informational Links
Thanks,
Ben
Benjamin Carnevale
Help Desk Supervisor
Blue Ridge Community College
540-453-2525
«FirstName»,
Tomorrow is the big day! As part of «Wave», your extension «Extn» will move to Teams Phone. Hopefully by now you’ve looked at the Teams app and asked us questions by replying to one of my emails or submitting a ticket.
FAQs
You all had great questions, and documentation was added to the knowledgebase to answer them. Some highlights:
Get Support
Everything has been tested thoroughly, but there’s always a chance for small kinks with a big migration like this. The Help Desk is ready for your questions tomorrow at 540-453-2400. We will have a new queuing feature enabled, so please hang on the line as long as is reasonable for you. If you are directed to voicemail, please leave us a message; a ticket with a transcription of your message will be created for us.
Reminders
- Please DO NOT unplug your Cisco phones. We will let you know when we’re coming to collect them and re-wire your space if necessary.
- Wave 2 will be external numbers until 9/19. Teams to Teams calling will be available, but transferring students will need full phone numbers. Calling and transferring from Wave 1 to Wave 2
- Verify Teams is set to open automatically and run in the background
- Voicemails will not transfer over. You can set a voicemail now in preparation.
Informational Links
I appreciate all the questions and pro-active testing you’ve been doing. Keep the questions coming and I’ll call you on the other side!
Feeling alive for go-live,
Ben
Benjamin Carnevale
Help Desk Supervisor
Blue Ridge Community College
540-453-2525
From: Benjamin Carnevale <carnevaleb@brcc.edu>
Sent: Tuesday, August 12, 2025 5:31 PM
To: Benjamin Carnevale <carnevaleb@brcc.edu>
Subject: Teams Phone: Cisco Phones Update - Wave 1
All,
You may have noticed that your Cisco phones continue to ring when called by another internal user using 60XXXX. This is to be expected for the moment, as they are still configured in the VCCS phone system. They can talk to each other, but the outside world can’t join the conversation, so to speak.
We are currently removing your migrated phone numbers from the VCCS system. This is a manual, number-by-number process that will take some time. Please keep your phones connected so they can receive this update.
In the next few weeks, we will be collecting the phones and rewiring your desks as needed. It is important that you leave your phones connected until we retrieve them.
This migration went very well because of YOU diligently testing and asking questions. Thank you, Wave 1, for your attention to detail, for clearly stating your needs and concerns, for helping to keep student communications an important focus of this migration, and for helping each other. I appreciate you facing down this big change with us!
As always, please keep sending any questions and concerns my way as they pop up.
Thanks,
Ben
Benjamin Carnevale
Help Desk Supervisor
Blue Ridge Community College
540-453-2525