Hotspots at the Westfield Athenaeum

Congratulations! You have borrowed one of the Athenaeum’s new hotspots. This lending program began as part of a statewide intitiative of the Massachusetts Board of Library Commissioners (MBLC), and is continuing with Athenaeum funds due to their popularity. This page is to help get you familiar with how to use the hotspot. For more detailed information, see the full user manual here.

First Steps

• Power on the hotspot by holding the button on the front. As it starts up, the hotspot should greet you with a “Welcome” message.

• The hotspot is ready to use when the interface says “T-Mobile”, along with some other graphics like below.

• Turn on whatever device you are hoping to access the internet with, and open the WiFi settings. This may look different from device to device. Feel free to give a call to 413-568-7833 x4 if you are having problems finding where to connect to the WiFi on your device.

• The WiFi networks provided by all of our hotspots are the same. The name is “Westfield Athenaeum”, and the password is “WestAthWifi”. 
• After entering this information, you should have access to the internet on the device of your choosing!
• When you are done using the hotspot, press and hold the power button until the display says “Goodbye.”

Troubleshooting

My device won’t turn on!

If the hotspot isn’t turning on, it’s most likely due to having a dead battery. We encourage all patrons to charge their hotspots before returning them to the library, but some may escape our notice. Plug the hotspot in to charge using the cable provided when you checked it out. If you find this still isn’t working to turn on the hotspot, bring it in to us at the Athenaeum and we’ll try to figure out what’s going on.

Why can’t I get Internet?

The hotspots rely on cellular towers to provide their Internet. If you are having problems getting Internet access at all, there will likely be few bars on the display of the hotspot, or else you may be in a remote location where cell access is difficult. Unfortunately, there isn’t much of a way around that. If it seems like the hotspot should still be getting Internet (either you’re in a more populated area or there are bars on the display but no Internet access), bring it in to us at the Athenaeum and we’ll try to figure out what’s going on.

I’m having trouble accessing a particular website.

The terms of the MBLC program require we have website filtering turned on for every hotspot that we lend out. If you find that this is prohibiting you from accessing necessary websites while borrowing the hotspot, contact us at the Athenaeum and we’ll be able to disable the filtering for your individual device. 

Can you show me how to use it?

Absolutely! If you’re running into issues getting your device connected or are unsure how to start and learn by doing, feel free to bring your hotspot and a device you want to connect over to the Reference desk at the Athenaeum. Our librarians will help get you started. 

More information about the concluded MBLC hotspot program can be found here.