District Office Tech Blog

September, 2007
Welcome to the first edition of the Technology Services e-Newsletter

This will be a news information and update posting about district technology initiatives that is scheduled to be shared every couple of months. If you are viewing this via the online blog, please leave your questions and comments below. if you are reading this information on paper, please send your questions and comments via email to tim_landeck@pvusd.net. Enjoy!

1) SIS - Student Information System - Through an extensive search and collaborative effort with many district employees, we have selected eSchoolPlus by Sungard Pentamation as our new SIS (Student Information System) to replace SASIxp. We intend to be fully moved to eSchoolPlus by fall of 2008. We have a training schedule that is available for download in MS Word format. For more information, please visit the eSchoolPlus web site at http://www.pentamation.com/k12/p-studentInfo.htm

2) Voice Over IP (VoIP) Telephone System - The new phone system has been installed at a total of 23 schools which is funded 77% by the federal Erate program. Teachers and staff have received training on the new phone system that includes voice mail for all staff, caller ID, e-911 (which alerts district office personnel when someone dials 911 and also alerts the police down to the detail of the specific building at the school site where the call was made). There is a new dialing plan to streamline access to staff and voice mailboxes.

3) New Servers at 7 Sites - Through the assistance of the Erate program, we have been funded to install seven new DHCP/DNS servers at seven schools in the central and south zones. These schools are: Ann Soldo School, Ea Hall, Landmark, Radcliff, Starlight, Summit School, and The New School. These servers have been ordered and are due to be installed in the month of September. This will greatly improve the Internet access for these sites which all have ailing servers.

4) Final installation of fiber optic connections for all schools - Through the assistance of the Erate program, we have been funded to complete the fiber optic data connection for all schools in the district. This connection will provide 100Mb connectivity for each site which in most cases is almost one hundred times faster than the previous connection over T-1 lines. But the best news is that the fiber optic connection is not only robust in speed, but it is much more reliable than the old T-1 copper connections. We will be maintaining the copper connections as well for a while but most of the school site internet traffic and telephone traffic will travel over the fiber optic connection. Sites should see a boost in internet speed but especially in speeds relating to such programs as SASIxp, Financials and other district and COE-based server applications.

5) Wireless Completion for most Central and South Zone Schools - Through the assistance of the Erate program, we have been funded to install the remaining Erate-qualifying schools with wireless access points. Once we have EA Hall, Landmark, Radcliff and the New School completed, all of these sites will have wireless coverage in all classrooms and most, if not all, of the campus.

6) KVM Install at 19 School Sites - Through the assistance of the Erate program, we have been funded to install KVM switches at 19 schools sites in the Central and South zones. These switches are due to all be installed by the end of September and will make it easier to access all servers on campus via a single keyboard, monitor and mouse (K=Keyboard, V=Video, M=Mouse…KVM). All servers have been moved to the school’s MDF (Main distribution frame…the main location where the router, switches and servers reside) which will further help to simplify the set up at each school and improve reliability of the technology.

7) Erate Year 10 projects still awaiting approval - like last year and the eight years prior, PVUSD Technology Services has applied for additional Erate funding for various projects this year. We have completed the PIA (Program Integrity Assurance) process and are still waiting for the Federal Government agency (SLD) to send us our approval letters….this is not uncommon as they are notoriously slow to process the mountains of paperwork that accompanies each application. In year 10 (for the 07/08 school year) we have applied for such items as Gaggle Student Email for all secondary students, SchoolLoop Communication System for all secondary schools, Internet connectivity for all schools, telephone (cellular and land lines) service for all schools, and Maintenance Agreements to support district Erated technologies. Due to the 2 in 5 Erate rule we can not ask for “internal Connections” (such as servers, networks, etc) more than two times out of every five years. We asked for Internal connections in year 9 (see projects highlighted above) so year 10 is a year we are not applying for additional internal connection items. The items we apply for in year 11 (application process begins October 2007) will depend on which sites qualify for the 90% discount and can receive the Internal Connections. The Erate program is a very “labor intensive” program that requires extensive research, quotes, bids, applications, backup paperwork and letters to receive funding. PVUSD has done very well with this in the past and due to the extensive efforts of the Technology Services Department and the Purchasing Department, PVUSD has been approved for an average of over four million dollars annually for the past few years. We anticipate this success to continue as long as the program is active, but it does create a lot of work and stress for the Technology Services department on an annual basis.

LCD Projector Installs at PMS - Pajaro Middle School has purchased an LCD projector for each of their 33 classrooms to be installed in a permanent mounting from the ceiling of each room. The projectors will connect to each of the teacher desktop computers so with the flick of a switch, whatever is on the teacher’s computer monitor (Web site, DVD video, PowerPoint, Excell, Picture, Spreadsheet, etc) can be displayed on the projection screen for the entire classroom to see. This is a great tool to enhance the use of technology in education because it makes it very easy for the teacher to truly integrate the technology into the classroom curriculum. Although the projectors and installation is not inexpensive, the value of this purchase and installation greatly outweighs the value of installing an additional 2 computers in each classroom. For more information about installing projectors in classrooms, please contact Tim Landeck.

9) Technicians get job title and job description update - Technology Services and the Human Resources department have worked with the Personnel Commission and the School District Governing Board to create new job descriptions and titles for the various technician positions in the district. This effort was to:
1. Clarify technician titles to make it more clear as to what their job responsibilities are and to assist in recruiting
2. Update the job descriptions to better align with the modern activities of the district and school site technician activities.
The School Site Network Technician position title was changed to Site Computer Support Technician
The Network Technician position title was changed to District Technology Support Technician
You can get a copy of the updated job descriptions from the Human Resources department.

10) Hiring more Technicians for schools sites and the district - Due to the above mentioned update of technician job descriptions and titles, there has been a delay in hiring new technicians for both schools sites and the district. Sean Lazar left PVUSD last spring after being with the district for many years and we are hoping to finish the hiring process for his position (District Technology Support Technician) sometime in the month of September. in addition, there are many other Site Computer Support Technician positions that schools sites are funding that also need to be hired. We are hoping that these positions will be filled sometime in September. Positions still waiting to be filed are:
District Technology Support Technician - District Office (1.0 FTE), Adult Education (1.0 FTE)
Site Computer Support Technician - Ann Soldo, Mar Vista, Rio Del Mar, Freedom, and Radcliff.

11) District Hires Technician to Support SuccessMaker Program - Due to the abundance of sites that have SuccessMaker installed and are using it as a viable math intervention program, the district has elected to fund a District Technology Support Technician position to support exclusively this Pearson product. Jose Anaya (formerly a Network technician for Mintie White and Ohlone Schools) has been hired to work closely with Technology Services and Melissa Christi of Research and Evaluation to support SuccessMaker at all 24 (and increasing) schools sites in the district with this valuable program. Jose just finished upgrading all of the SuccessMaker servers to the latest version of the software so it can now also support Intel Macintosh computers and Macintosh OS X in native mode. Windows schools will also see some improvements in the speed of the software and the graphics due to the updated server software. Welcome Jose! He has already made a positive and bold mark on SuccessMaker in the PVUSD.

12) Curricular Online Resources - Again this year, Technology Services and Federal and State Programs are funding district-wide curricular resources for all PVUSD students and staff. Most of these online resources are available via the new Ed1Stop Web portal to eliminate the need for multiple logins to access all resources. With the help of this portal, students and staff have an individual login and password which will then unlock the access to all of the enclosed resources and no additional authentication (passwords) will be needed. Therefore, the educational one-stop-shop of the Ed1Stop portal will provide an easier route for teachers and students to access these resources. The ed1Stop portal is available via the STUDENT tab at the top of the district web site. There are many resources available via the ed1Stop portal but some of these resources are described below:
a) United Streaming (Ed. Videos online w/ Lesson Plans - Technology Services Funded)
b) NetTrekker (Content Standards aligned web search engine and more -Technology Services Funded )
d) My Access (Online writing tool – SWEET Grant funded)
e) Gaggle (Student email – Erate, Technology Services and Site funded)
f) SchoolLoop (parent/student/staff online communication system, grade book and more for secondary grades- Erate, Technology Services and Site funded)
g) Ed1Stop Portal (Santa Cruz COE portal for all educational online software - Technology Services Funded)

9) Technology Liaison Program begins third year - The Technology Liaison Program has been a great success by identifying one teacher at each school site that takes on the additional responsibilities of supporting the technology initiatives at their school site. This has been an invaluable program to help promote technology integration in the schools, communication between the schools and the Technology Services department, technical support and technology staff development. For more information, please visit the Technology Liaison web site under Technology Services on the District web site.

10) Grant to Install Video Surveillance Safety Systems - Technology Services in cooperation with the Watsonville Police department have been awarded a grant to fund a partial video surveillance safety system for some secondary schools in the South and Central Zones. The matching COPS grant is a state safety grant designed to provide a “seed” installation of cameras at Watsonville High School, Pajaro Valley High School, Rolling Hills Middle School and Cesar Chavez Middle School. These cameras will not cover all areas of the campus but will install cameras in “hot spots” identified by both the Police department and PVUSD site administration and the needed server-based hardware to enable additional cameras to be installed as further funding becomes available. Installation of the systems is due to be completed by the end of 2007.

11) Athena gets Upgrade to InfoCenter - The Athena library automation software will be moving to a centralized web-based upgraded version called InfoCenter. A copy of all school Athena library databases have been added to a “training InfoCenter Server” for the Library Techs to use while learning the new system. All Library techs will be trained by Technology Services over a three day period this fall to prepare for a complete switchover to InfoCenter during Winter Break.

12) Board Room AV Upgrade - The long awaited AV upgrade to the District Board Room has been completed. The AV equipment has been moved to an upstairs remote location and remote-controlled cameras have been installed in the board room to provide improved video production quality. 9 ceiling speakers have been installed in the Board Room for better room sound and an improved podium microphone has been installed. There are numerous other improvements to the system but best is to either attend one of the district board meetings or watch the AV results on the local television stations. Board meetings are not broadcast live (yet) but they are videotaped and broadcast for the community to stay up to date on current issues being addressed and decisions being made. The community is able to watch the most recent Board meetings on the following days:

City of Watsonville Channel 70 :
Channel 70 (Charter): Saturdays at 2:00 pm and Wednesdays at 6:30 pm

Community Television of Santa Cruz:
Channel 71 (Charter) and Channel 25 (Comcast): Sundays at 7 pm and Wednesdays at 9 am (note: meetings are played once on the Sunday following the meeting of the Board; it is then repeated ONCE on the subsequent Wednesday)

13) New Staff and Student User Shares - Technology Services has purchased the necessary equipment to implement a user share for every staff member and secondary student in the district. This is a very involved process that has taken extensive research and application to make it a reliable system and we are almost ready to roll it out district-wide. This will greatly help with the added value of DeepFreeze software which helps to protect the computer desktop at the same time as not preventing students from changing computer settings or preferences.

14) Energy Saving Software to be installed district-wide - In an effort to conserve resources, PVUSD Technology Services will be implementing an energy saving software package that will automatically put computers to sleep that have not been used for a certain amount of time. This is estimated to save approximately $25 per computer for each year that it is in use. We presently have over 5000 computers in the district so this could equate to extensive energy (and cost) savings district-wide. In addition, the software meets PGandE Energy Saving requirements and provides a rebate to the district to help offset the cost of the software. We hope to have this software implemented district-wide before January of 2008.

15) EETT Competitive Grant Round 6 Application Submitted - Technology Services has written a new version of the existing S.W.E.E.T Grant (See below) in hopes of getting another round of funding from EETT (Enhancing Education Through Technology) to improve Language arts instruction with technology at three North Zone schools (Valencia, Bradley and Aptos Jr). We hope to hear the results of this application sometime in September, 2007.

16) EETT (S.W.E.E.T.) Grant in 2nd Year - 5 PVUSD Middle schools have received an Enhancing Education Through Technology (EETT) grant to improve student writing with the assistance of language arts classroom laptops. The S.W.E.E.T. (Student Writing Enhanced with Educational Technology) was awarded to Rolling Hills, Alianza, EA Hall, Lakeview and Pajaro Middle School. Language Arts teachers have received 4 days of training on using the laptops and online resources to work with the school’s existing writing program to improve student writing. For more information about this grant, please see the SWEET Web Site or contact Grant Coffin at 831-786-2100 ext 399.

17) K-12 Voucher Funds used to Support District Schools - The Microsoft settlement funds (now known as the K-12 Voucher funds) have finally arrived after 6 years in the courts and the Technology Services department has worked with the PVUSD Technology Liaisons to help identify viable uses for these funds. The funds are to be spent over a six year period of time and are intended for district initiatives. Funds are distributed to the district technology Services department to spend on items that are in the district Technology Use Plan and that would benefit one or more of the qualifying schools. The Technology Services department is making extensive efforts to use the funds for programs and products that affect all schools and are items that will benefit these schools for years to come. There is a lot of information available about the K-12 voucher program as well as some misleading information from vendors. All funds are distributed in two buckets: General fund and Software fund. It is easy to qualify for the general fund vouchers but the software fund vouches are the more “difficult” vouchers to qualify for. At present the Technology Services has been able to get three items to qualify under the software voucher bucket:
i) iLife and OS X Maintenance for 36 months ( all schools) Mac OS and iMovie, Garage Band, etc
ii) DeepFreeze (3 years, all schools) Restart computer to revert to saved state
iii) Bradford Networks (all schools) Secure wireless network
Site Technology Liaisons have additional information about the above three programs and the K-12 Voucher program in general.

18) New Blogs Available for District Staff Use - Technology Services has recently begun to offer PVUSD Blogs for staff to use to support the educational goals of their classroom. Staff can request a Blog account via the district bog site at http://blog.pvusd.net.

There are many other projects and activities sponsored by the Technology Services department but these are a few to help bring you up to speed about the activities and initiatives we are working on this year. Please feel free to leave a comment here on the blog or send them directly to the Director of Technology Services, Tim Landeck at tim_landeck@pvusd.net or by calling him at 831-786-2333.