Sharing good practice

[Liam]

So, I'm sure in not alone in thinking that sometimes ICT staff aren't given all of the credit / appreciation they deserve.

A lot of the work we all do is crucial to the everyday running of school networks to ensure smooth running but actually the majority of if goes unnoticed. I mean you spend a full summer rebuilding a network with refreshed computers throughout and a new wireless infrastructure and yet you are still asked.. 'Oh did you have a nice summer' !! Oh cheers! Lol.

 

So my question is... What have you done that has really positively impacted on the teaching and learning. It's all well and good me getting software to manage user accounts directly from sims but actually, although my life is easier it's not really helped with T&L except less time is spent being reactive now.

 

As an example, i introduced the ability for staff to change student passwords many moons ago or remote working (the devil that it is)and that was the best thing since sliced bread. I'm looking for something to really put us on the map.

 

I hope this makes sense. I'm not really looking to spend money , but I'm sure someone out there is doing something that actually makes a big difference. Hopefully we can all benefit from sharing a bit of good practice! [emoji3]

[FN-GM]

Its like that in all sorts of jobs. If everything is ticking over and working fine you are put to the back of the mind naturally. People only notice things when you have a complaint. I bet its the same with the cooks and the cleaning staff.

[Ephelyon]

From my Chronicles of RITTech (very short sentences owing to its character limits):

 

"My solution to giving students freedom to explore and learn without risking compromise to network security:

 

Refurbished server (12 cores, 64GB RAM), installed VMware ESXi, Free license. 10 student VMs running latest Windows with latest IDEs installed (Visual Studio 2015, NetBeans, Python and Unity). Students have full admin access, another VM set up with 2TB project storage (ABE enabled) accessible from main network and VMs themselves. VMs on isolated vSwitch so they can see only each other and the "file server" VM. ESXi user roles set up so that students can only start and interact with their VMs (no others). VMs reset to snapshot every midnight (Cron job), so students can test/break them at will without contaminating the network. Accessed through ESXi console or RDP through NETSH port forwarding, which also gives VMs Internet access with default student filtering (safeguarding)."

 

It's done a grand job of turning the traditional 'battle' between NMs and ICT/CS teachers into a non-entity. Could easily be replicated elsewhere if you can lay your hands on a refurbished box of a similar spec - @ICTDirect_Dave has things like that going for around £800.

[EvLPhenom]

Most recently it has been upgrading the backbone of the network to make it more stable and to improve the speed across the network along with updating to a new wireless system. New image for all machines that got rid of alot of old software that wasn't used and generally making things quicker for the end user so they don't have to sit and wait 15 minutes for a class of laptops to login. Currently our networks are running smoother than ever and allows us to plan for future projects and do preventative work, while we maybe on the back burner for now i think the work leading up to this has shown what we can do. Often little chats with our IT Coordinator about things lets them know what we are and planning to do aswell as anything that they want from their point of view.

[ICTDirect_Dave]

@ICTDirect_Dave has things like that going for around £800.

 

They're even cheaper now

[atechguy]

Had a couple myself a while back to use for ESXI Hosts, Still going strong i beleive.

 

They're even cheaper now