Noteworthy Stuff: Updates and Upgrades

• Things of note:
• Please pardon the progress:   Lots going on with FC upgrades and infrastructure updates, etc....
• FC Calendars and Contact lists will take some time to 're-discover' so please be patient, since our primary goal is to ensure the migration is complete and functional including the archive server installation
• Remember your new email address is first initial last name@rsu36.net and you should receive mail from the sad36.org address
• Change your FC password from fclivermore10
• We worked on the long log-ins during Feb break for those still experiencing long log-ins.  Remember RD on the Macbooks is quicker and if you must log in to the local computer please do so.
• We have not set FC email spam filters but we know MSLN is catching spam
• There will be more painful but fruitful growth...
• There will be a learning curve for the new FC version so anything you discover please share.  A few of us will be attending an FC training in March since FC 9.1-10.1 is quite dynamic. 
•  For FC webcasts and tutorials visit tutorials
• The tech dept is aware of all the pains of growth and we feel it as well (trust us, here) and are sensitive to the transitions that have added frustrations and concerns...and we still have a long ways to go...and we have a plan and we are working it...
• We have devleoped training times in all schools:  LES -Thurs (Tanberg video conf); LHS - Wed.(Student logins); and LMS-Tues.(Remoting)  All imeetings in the media centers/libraries and at 2'sh.  These will focus on the new stuff coming into your schools like  FC, remote desktop, TS etc...but feel free to bring any issues......The main goal is to establish these times and to consistently meet.
• Things of interest:
• We are still tranisitioning the LMS and when complete it will be a total Mac School complete with a new Mac server.  Reallocating many PC's will be complete by April vacation.  
• The tech team will be sending out short surveys  over the next few weeks and months about tech use (I know, nothing new here) and would like to meet individually and through teams to develop a professional development model for next year.  This year has been about necessary infrastructure replacement and repair and next year will be about using the technology relevant to our needs.
• We are developing and modifying staff acceptable use policies since these not only protect us but educate us about professional use.  Read http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/education/8523807.stm.  Student use policies will follow.....
• A bare bones website should be published by the second week of March
• We met with a Tanberg video conferencing grant writer and one will be submitted for the high school.  We hope to use the Tanberg for the Mega Deaf Conference Feb 24.
• We met with the Apple sales rep to discuss the implementation of the Macbooks and discussed issues with interactive whiteboards.  We will set up training with mimio boards and have discovered that the Sunburst boards are incompatible with the Macbooks, so as we reallocate PC's and other equipment in April, we will have to make a plan for this.
• We will be purchasing 10 ipod touches to assist with data management - and to keep up with the students:)

Celebrate! Doing grades seems to have been painless this time around.

Informative webcasts from MLTI - http://www.maine.gov/tools/whatsnew/index.php?topic=MLTIPD&id=91083&v=Calendar or any of these archived webcasts: http://maine121.org/webcasts/archives/

There was some concern about personal use and misuse of the First Class email. Email servers and its content are the property of SAD/RSU36. There is no expectancy of privacy. We monitor all systems for functionality, safety, and maintenance reasons.

Tanberg group - We are learning to find resources. We working to locate local contacts and perhaps create a local group to share and develop video conferencing uses from sharing class with local schools to doing book-reads via videconferencing. Join us at LES on Thursdays at 2'sh if you want to. Visit http://edblasting.wikispaces.com/LMS+Technology+Resources

Web developers group met Feb 4 to discuss and decide content and layout of necessary pages and links. The goal is to work towards a live date for the district page by the second week of March. From there we will continue to develop school pages.

Met with LMS team leaders to discuss the changeover to logins and profiles for them. They to will be able to access remotely and do grades from anywhere if they wish.

We completed setting student gmails for inter-district use and applied safety features for monitoring use and protecting users. Students will be able to email each other and teachers in the district. Of course, other means for communication exist through Studywiz, shares, Pages to name a few.

Long logins still plague us and we have been working on solutions: blocking ipod touch use, rewiring and pinning old ehternet chords that may be affecting connections, checking with msln about the condition of their connection devices, upgrading to Windows server 2008, etc...Solutions to avoiding long-logins: Use local login (that is, not the rsu36.local); use your Macbook, don't logoff daily or shut down daily

Migration from the old First Class server to a new one will begin soon and we recommend you back up important files you may not want to lose. The age of the current FC server and software is many updates behind and requires several migrations. An archiving server will be added as well for federal compliance.