Chromebooks as exam laptops and other Chromebook possibilities.

[Stockcube]

Firstly, Hi, I'm new here, this is my first post!

 

I'm an apprentice, aged 17, working in a private school/sixth form college in the UK with approximately 800 students.

 

Being an apprentice, my knowledge of systems isn't anywhere near perfect, and I still have much to learn. One of my colleagues directed me here for advice, and our network manager set me up with the task of finding out what we can do with these wonderful Chromebooks.

I've had plenty of experience with Chromebooks from previous use, but only as an end user, and personally, I love them to bits, and they're quite impressive.

 

Now however, having more of administrative role, I'm not sure that Chromebooks are going to be as simple as they look...

 

For exams in the school, some students are allowed to use laptops if they require them under their circumstances. I don't actually know very much about our current situation, but from what the Network Manager briefly explained and what I can remember of it, he said something about the laptops being locked down completley other than an RDP connection to a server on which said student will write up their exam using MS Office Word.

 

So the question is, is there anything of the sort that can be done with Chromebooks? Can they be locked down? Is it possible to use Chrome apps / a specific Chrome web app (for RDP, for example) and block everything else? Should it be done through the wireless access point (i.e. block everything except a whitelist of specific URLs)? Is Office Web Apps an idea? (We are planning on putting in an Office 365 setup some time later this year, if this opens any possibilities.)

 

Looking forward to hearing some ideas / feedback

[CyberNerd]

If you want to manage chromebooks you need the management tool, which is Google Apps not Office 365.

https://support.google.com/chrome/a/answer/1289314?rd=1

Presumably you could use this to decide which chrome apps can be installed/used. Combine with some filtering of course.

[pcstru]

Welcome to Edugeek.

 

I think first you would need to be managing the devices via Google Apps for Education control panel. You could then use the URL blocking in the chrome management settings. Unfortunately in many circumstances chromebooks must have access to some URL's (google) to function at all, so it may not be possible to comply with the strict access required.