At the beginning of this semester, BJU began offering students 20 GB of free online storage through a service called Box.

If you’re not familiar with Box, there are plenty of reasons why you should want to be. Box offers all the standard features of similar online storage services such as Google Drive. This means that just like the other services, Box lets you save your data in an online folder, a sort of digital version of a storage locker. This makes your files more accessible because you can access them from any computer or mobile device, and safer because since the files are on the Web, even if your computer crashes, your files won’t be lost.

But on top of all these normal features, since the University pays for students and faculty to have enterprise-level access to Box, there is a host of features students get for free that would usually cost a monthly fee.

Here are some reasons why you might want to be familiar with Box:

The first reason is storage. Most free online storage services like Google Drive give only five to10 GB of free storage. The Box service through BJU doubles that amount with 20 GB. That’s double the space to store all the pictures, school papers and music you want, all at no cost.

The second reason is security. Again, since the University is giving students enterprise-level access to the Box service, your files will be protected at an enterprise level. No other free service will give you that kind of protection.

Third, all students and faculty have been given access to Box. This may not seem like a big deal at first, but the more people who use Box, the easier sharing files between people will become. Many classes now have huge amounts of files stored at the network, but as Lauren Peterson, a senior mathematics major, who has been leading the Box project since last summer explained:

“Previously you could theoretically access class files from anywhere, but doing that wasn’t easy. But since Box is Web-based, sharing files and getting access to them is much easier.”

Last, you don’t have to worry about losing all these premium features after you leave the University. Box is allowing students who leave BJU to transfer all their data to a personal account and still retain all the space and features of an enterprise account. Combining all the wonderful benefits of online storage plus free premium features makes using Box a no-brainer.