Oct+30,+2014+Minutes

October 30 Minutes

__ Discussion around BYOM and Tech fee. __ We need to honor our students who payed the tech fee for the next 2 1/2 years.

__ Discussion around teacher tech competencies __

__ Discussion about teacher owned computers. __ Can we make a recommendation from this group to move forward with the model of teacher owned computers. The ideas is that teachers will buy their machines and be reimbursed.

Teacher computers are on a 4 year cycle. If we are looking at a 16-17 year roll out, let's begin planning now.

Discussion to be tabled til Jeff Rosen joins us in the afternoon.
 * Update Jeff asked us to put together a proposal about what other benchmark schools are doing. Josh will spearhead.

__ Discussion about Yosemite __ Spotlight is nice. Safari is slower than Chrome. The apple apps work seamlessly Some projectors do not have a nice connection with Yosemite - there is a tricky fix. Printing is an issue. Simon P has found a fix, but it is a bit problematic. Anna says that it will be 6-8 weeks til we have a more permanent fix for printing. Merry Christmas from our tech dept.

Can we change our language to

__ Printing woes __ Several teachers are burning through their money. Printers are also not clearing old settings when someone logs out. Anna has contacted Equitrac and we are investigating.

__ Mac Authentication & Student Emails __ We need to email our kids to communicate with them. Can we create our own student server to run our own email. Orion says that solves some problems and creates a whack of new ones. Maintaining the server, backing up the server, it would limit the size of student emails. Orion says it is the worst option Office 365 (O365) is being talked about a lot in China. It is hosted in Beijing - this side of the firewall. Anna gave us info. The basic package is free for students, but if you want extras you pay. Extras include backing up, 15 rmb for students per month, 30 rmb for teachers per month This package includes Word, Excel, Ppt, Outlook, Publisher, Access, Link, One Note. Has collaborative docs etc That server is not replicated outside of China One drive has replaced Sky drive. Microsoft There is a 30 day free trial. Microsoft could come for a presentation for us.

__ Mac Authentication con't __ Big issues, particularly in PXHS, with kids not in Casper. Approx 1/2 the kids in PKHS are not on Casper. We are waiting for a patch Anna: The best way to check for Casper is to check last log-in. Dominic: If it's working, let's leave it be until next August until we can enforce it. Bobby: Let's create a list of talking points to speak with our teachers, kids, parents about BYOM and what it looks like.

__ Apple TVs __ Is anyone budgeting for Apple TVs. You need 10.10 for it to work. Could we do common areas for Apple TVs? Conference rooms, Lecture Halls? Each division budget for their common conference areas.

__ Calendaring __ Jeff and Simon have ironed a lot of this out. webcalendars@sasstudent.org has been added to every calendar at SAS. Adding a steady email in each calendar providing us access is a big step in the right direction. What is the next step and what do we need to do? Change from personal gmail addresses to school gmail addresses - sasstudent.org

__ Platform Housekeeping __ Bobby has the information for our excess gmail accounts. We have close to 6000 accounts being used. We need to delete many. Bobby is working on a system to delete the excess without deleting any important ones. Bobby is leading the charge. When he figures out a system that works he'll share it with the other divisions. It needs to be done before next year. Bobby will bring back info to our next meeting. Thank you PXMS!

__ Blogs.saschina.org __ They are still there, but they are inaccessible. They are offline. It's in Orion's hands now.

Same with the old video portal. Delete!

__ Teacher Portfolio & iweb __ We are no longer encouraging people to use iweb. Copy and paste from you iweb into a blog. We're not supporting it.

__ Performance Evaluation __ Josh is the man. He created a template on Edublogs. I used the first letter last name portfolio in the url. ie sites.saschin.org/khevlandportfolio Josh has also created an educator portfolio page. Josh is going to finish the specialist (counselors and coaches)

__ Kaltura __ A media serving platform. Friendly with IOS devices. A possible replacement to the clipbucket. Very successful for embedding into Moodle. Can it be used in other applications. What about the divisions PXES and PDES who do not use Moodle

__ LMS __ Simon, Amy and Josh are looking at Schoology. Simon has arranged a $1500 3 month trial. It answers some big questions - media, It is clean and usable and will work for any division. The big question is connectivity in China.

__ Pukunui __ What's up with that? We will have Moodle for at least a year. Training costs $6000. Spots available for up to 15 people. We have paid for technical support. Bottom line: We have to upgrade Moodle.

Tech coaches to transfer people on Flex page themes by Dec 12. We will ask Pukunui to upgrade the system over the Christmas holiday.

__ Communication and Tracking __ Dom: Help Race is working great but it does not have analytics so it is useless to us without data. Ticketing program is working. Jeff: Sysaid.com It's working. China is not a problem. Jeff wants to try it out a bit more. We are eligible for his free trial.

What are the criteria for our Communication and Tracking provider? - must collect analytics - support mobility phone or tablet

Josh is going to set up a trial with Zendesk.

Sysaid costs approx $1435.00

__ SmartMusic __ Simon is still talking to Smart Music to try to recoup any of our money. Or to possibly use our unused subscriptions next year.

__ Ordering and Subscriptions __ Jeff R suggested we continue on as the past. We make a request list. We ask our teachers to channel tech requests through us. When it comes to make choices about what to purchase that will be an open and transparent discussion between Jeff R and principals and us.

We expressed some of our frustrations about the ordering process.

Replacement computers? These come out of Orion's budget.

What is our plan for ipads? Is there a cycle for ipads like macbooks?


 * can we move forward with one email address on all subscriptions - Jeff D will meet with Jewel.

Can we give money back to teachers for apps like Evernote or Confer or Doceri. Put in a line item for subscriptions? Then use as needed.

Apple Centre contract is up end of 2016.