December Department of Technology Update

This meeting was held on a webx:  Held on Thursday, December 15th at 1:00 PM

Updates:

I may have missed a couple at the start :(  Carla Miller was talking and I got cut off...)  If anyone knows what was said in the first few minutes, please email me and I will add to the notes :)

February 21st is the new go live date for the new email

• Some training will be happening ahead of time; there will be online training, some face to face training as well starting on January 3rd. Updates will come out on the TBT and on the workshop calendar

School Wires Update:

• Plan of action for improving future problems (like we experienced in November) is now in place…
• Marlo will include more in a TBT.
• Also there will be an update about the rotating pictures on the main pages.
• They are switching to the photo gallery since the rotating imaged may be a source of some problems.
• Official website rubric for teachers should be coming in the next few weeks. Marlo will put information on the TBT about this.

Learning Village.

• Common Core training resources—There was a cry for everything in one location.
• There is now a giant blue bar at the top, with the Common Core resources broken down my level (elementary, middle and high)
• Middle and High will be complete by middle of next week (December 21st).
• You will be able to see what’s available to you under the core resources
• Grade level power points, etc. and new information will be posted as future meetings happen starting in January.
• January 23 is the next Core training for technology—Theme will be “technology as a tool”
• Information has also been shared at principals meetings too about these new Learning Village Resources

Betty Weycker/ student use of galaxy tablets?

• They are not ready yet.
• More things are being found that we need
• More infrastructure work need to take place before this can happen
• For example, we need research the best cart for a charging station
• Tablets damaged, lost or taken? Policy needs to be written
• Getting them to be able to work with our active directory.
• Galaxy tablet will be the choice for online testing/assessments
• Also looking at a 10 inch device, will continue to post the pricing for the 7 inch device for now
• But NO they are not ready to deploy in class settings at this point.
• Still pushing out to admins.
• Wifi version is on the price list
• 3G version of the tablet-- there is a little back ordering going on with Sprint,
• WIFI is the most cost efficient (cost wise) and they encourage this vs recurring charges of the 3 G plan
• Connect Galaxy to a projector--? –need video out? Maybe a usb to video cord?…Kevin will check on this...
  Other News:

• Welcome Cory Robins—new technician
• Marty Creets (sp?) also joining the instructional team.
• Batteries for light speed microphones—new order is in place
• Next technical update meetings will be coming in January.  Kevin would like to do more webx meetings--let them get through the opening of the new schools and then things should be better.