Junior school password policy - what do you do?

[adminray]

Hello!

 

It's been ages since I posted here. Just wondering what others do when dealing with Password policy for junior age kids? We run a Windows 2012 AD with Google Apps (not yet linked together) and all students from year 2 up to year 6 have their own username j.bloggs and password which is basically very easy for anyone to guess. There is no possibility (that I know of!) of access from outside, but if a child were to use another child's account, then they could deliete al ltheir work and it would be difficult to track.

 

One solution would be to give all the kids a unique and complex password and spend a lot of time helping them to memorize this. We use Scratch 2.0 online and other web based cloud type services and all require complex passwords. Even given that one should really use a different password for each service, one complex password that's been memorised is better than several weak ones???

 

How do other admins from junior schools manage passwords?

 

Thanks anticipation for any opinions or advice!

 

Ray

[hardtailstar]

I know its a bad choice but each child here uses their Library number.

 

We found they kept forgetting passwords but they all know their library number so we used the same.

 

Of course we cant stop other kids finding out library numbers but we can restore work from a back up if its deleted.

[synaesthesia]

I'm seeing an increase in laminated cards being given to children for this purpose, often either with full password details or "hints" (like a partial reminder)

Maybe something that would be unique, "complex" but at the same time easy for a child to remember could be made up of several things:

 

Class name (like Red or 3MB depending on your setup, can cover capitals and maybe numbers)

Day of Birth (covers numbers)

Something unique for the child; if they were able to pick their own 3-5 letter word to remember, *that* is the part of the password they have to remember, whether it's cat, dog, fish or xbox

 

So, quite easily you could have a reasonably complex password like 3MB15xbox that will either become second nature, or if the child can only remember their quick password, a member of staff can easily help them.

[Joanne]

None of the pupil accounts here have passwords. I have backups if anything bad happens. No issues to date of children deleting each others work. I would never have this policy in a high school though.

[Smee]

We have just bought in the use of passwords across the whole school (Primary) Initially the passwords were set at the name of the class the student was in, but on the first log on they had to change their password. The KS2 children had the idea of complex passwords explained to them as part of an E-safety lesson. The KS1 children been given the option of choosing a word they can spell (!) and most of the KS1 teachers have kept a record of their classes passwords. All teaching staff have the ability to reset passwords for their classes so they shouldn't (HA!) have to ask me to change them when they are forgotten.

[dhicks]

Even given that one should really use a different password for each service, one complex password that's been memorised is better than several weak ones???

 

We go for a complex password that's available to the teacher - the pupil should know it, but if they don't the teacher can quickly look it up. It seems to work well enough for our classes, although our maximum class size is 18 - it might not scale up to a classroom of 30. One proper, integrated login account for all web-based services is best - users shouldn't have to set the same password multiple times.

[abillybob]

All our children from Year 2 and up have their own passwords and user names as well. I just made it so that everyone's password was something simple like Password1 at the start and then allowed all children to change it to whatever they wanted once they have logged in.

They all chose their special word and are told no one should know this special word, we haven't had any issues yet and you'd be quite surprised how protective the children are when asked by other members of staff or students for that matter for their special word.

 

Though if we ever did have any problems a backup would sort it out.

[adminray]

Thanks very much all! That's actually really very helpful to hear so many different approaches.. I think we'll end up going for cards or something similar. Possibly. I wonder how to integrate so many services technically without 3rd party support applications?

[Oaktech]

We are years 3-6 here. Students passwords are 3 characters or more, and expire every 60 days. We encourage the kids to have their own password, but each class has an assigned 'easy' password - something like 'sat' or 'ball', which the teacher gives out to the kids who can't remember what they had for breakfast. There is no lockout policy on student accounts. Previous versions is available on all accounts should anyone's work go walkies.

 

Staff passwords are 8 characters or more, must fulfil complexity requirements, expire every 30 days, remember the last 3 passwords and have a 6 strike lockout policy.

[pooley]

Primary school here. reception - year 2 have generic username + single letter password. Years 3+4 have their own username and default password "pupil". Year 5+6 can choose their own password.

 

No passwords are set to expire.

 

 

Si

[Valsh]

Not exactly the same, but we're a SEN school so forgotten passwords is almost a daily occurrence.

 

Currently they use their username + 4 random numbers and I've made available to staff a full list of usernames and passwords as it can really take a large chunk of time out of a lesson if they're trying to get 10-15 students logged on.

 

It's obviously not the most secure but I'm prepared to put in a bit of extra work restoring stuff from our regular backups if anything happens.

[TomHD]

Much like @pooley, our Early Years students login with the same username with no password. Years 1-2 have their own usernames as (firstname)(first initial of surname)(last initial of surname) but all have the same easy to remember password. Years 3-6 have their own usernames and their own password which is not complex but does have to be 6 characters.

 

All teachers have a student password management tool so no need to hunt me down for that.

 

Never been asked to sort out deleted work but can restore from daily backup should it ever happen!

 

Hope this helps

 

TomHD

Edited January 20, 2015 by TomHD

[Patrick]

we use generic class accounts all the way through the school. Not secure at all, but some schools we only visit when there's a fault and to keep coming back for forgotten passwords would be a nightmare. Never had pupils delete each others work and we have backups. It works well really. Wouldn't dream of using it in secondary though.