Getting SLT on board with Laptops for staff

[mdrabble]

SLT have has a policy in place even before I started 6 years ago that once exisiting staff laptops failed then they wouldnt be replaced.

 

Exisiting staff laptops - are basically for them to use as they please.

 

I am wanting to change this and try to persuade SLT the value of giving teaching staff laptops again but this time they will be managed laptops - so we control what is installed etc

 

I have tried pointing out some of the benefits such as makes training easier as everyone will be using the same platform if working from home and will also help deliver lessons with in school or from home should they need to teach remotely.

 

Struggling to put words on a page to try and sell this to SLT..... so if anyone is who as done this before be willing to share any proposals they have put together for laptops projects for staff?

 

 

Cheers

[CHiLL]

If one of your teachers is isolating, are they just off and not working? Or are they expected to teach? Our policy is that isolating staff are expected to work as normal (where possible) from home, such as delivering a lesson to students via Teams with a cover supervisor being the adult in the class room. Sure, you can have spare laptops to provide these staff when needed...but that's not really covid secure, as you have to get the laptop to them somehow. What if you have more teachers isolating than spare laptops?

[mdrabble]

Staff are excepted to work as normal.

 

I've tried point out to SLT that providing training is harder as staff are using personal devices at home - so no common platform and there are some slight difference when using Teams on the different platforms.

 

I just get the usual respond - no money.

[Scotbynature]

This seems to be becoming a more wide spread trend. I have now heard a few schools taking a similar approach as laptops dont offer a good return on investment. They need replacing more often and are more likely to be broken or need some type of intervention from an IT person than what a PC will. The last argument I heard was that if the teacher needs to do work then they should do this work in school on a PC and then go home and have family time.

 

I do not fall within this group. I look at it from my wife's standpoint who is a year 2 teacher but we also have two young children. My wife works in school until about 4 PM and then packs up, comes home and sees our children and depending on how she feels talks to me, haha. Then once we have put our children to bed she will get her laptop out and do her work that needs doing. This arrangement would not be possible if she didn't have a laptop and the only IT arrangements the school had were based in the actual building.

 

In todays world I think schools need to think much more flexibly and look at learning from a world point and not put barriers in place.

[ThatBoringBloke]

When COVID appeared on the scene we immediately purchased all of our staff chromebooks. the reasoning behind this was simple, if you are expected to work from home then we need to supply you with the tools to do so. All bar one staff member accepted the school issued chromebook as they felt they didn't need it.

 

For us (this may/maynot be relevant) being a Google school for the past 5 years has made things much easier. Everything is online.

Now that COVID has forced us to change the way we work we even automatically forced the 'old school' to move to the online world and by giving them the tools to do it gave them no excuse.

[Danp]

Staff are excepted to work as normal.

 

I've tried point out to SLT that providing training is harder as staff are using personal devices at home - so no common platform and there are some slight difference when using Teams on the different platforms.

 

I just get the usual respond - no money.

 

Personal devices = high chance pupil data is being stored on an unknown system that is outside of school's control. Use the GDPR angle to get through to them.

[DalekSec]

Personal devices = high chance pupil data is being stored on an unknown system that is outside of school's control. Use the GDPR angle to get through to them.

 

^ This, personal devices should NEVER have pupil data on them and definitely not be being used for teaching etc.

[mavhc]

There's always money, they just don't want to spend it on that.

 

1. You require all data offsite to be encrypted and used securely. Can't do that with random computers people own

2. Support costs £x/hour, computers you didn't setup require y hours more support, in total that will cost x*y*number of staff

3. You'll save on buying desktops

4. Staff will be more efficient, saving £a/hour (whatever teachers are paid)

[jthompson]

A laptop can be working for the school at any hour of the day or night, in any location. The same can't really be said for PCs in classrooms or offices. You get a lot more bang for your buck in that sense.

 

Requiring staff to work at home without providing them with a computer to use seems absurd. What meaningful work can be done these days without a computer?

[localzuk]

I'm not sure I understand any claims that a laptop for a teacher is a bad investment. An average laptop will last a good 5 years these days. Say you spend £500 on it. Are those schools seriously saying the investment of £100 a year is not worth it, when they're paying those members of staff £30k a year etc?

 

Seems like quibbling over pennies in the scheme of things to be honest.

 

We expect staff to teach using modern technologies, so we should be providing the equipment for them to do so.

[the_quick]

We are having exactly this discussions. In the past we had same as @mdrabble , we had problem where out staff treated school laptop as a home main computer - kids using it, parents for home banking etc. SLT didn't want to get into arguments how these should be used and they decided there no money to replace old ones.

 

Now with covid we start looking at options and most likely we will start buying Chromebooks for staff. Apart from the ICT teachers - they need proper laptops. But I'm pushing for strong rules how these should be used at home. Will see...

[TwistedHelixis]

When I worked in the city nobody would work remotely without being given the right tools to do the job being asked, I don't see any difference in that for teachers. If a school wants their staff to work from home then give them the tools they need to do that job.

 

Also, same as above, all our laptops last at least 5 years and are a very good investment imo

[Ditto]

I'm not sure I understand any claims that a laptop for a teacher is a bad investment. An average laptop will last a good 5 years these days. Say you spend £500 on it. Are those schools seriously saying the investment of £100 a year is not worth it, when they're paying those members of staff £30k a year etc?

 

Seems like quibbling over pennies in the scheme of things to be honest.

 

We expect staff to teach using modern technologies, so we should be providing the equipment for them to do so.

Absolutely this. The CEO of my governance school would do the maths and divide up the investment of £500 spend over, let's go conservatively 3 years, but then divide by the number of days in a term, then per pupil - it's going to be pennies per pupil. You probably spend more on pens and paper! He did this when we invested in interact digital screens for every classroom and that was nearer £2,500 per classroom. No arguments from head or BM - although the fact he was CEO might have made the difference more than the maths!

[Katy]

We had the same thing - staff laptops in 2008 ish, then we merged with another school and joined a trust in 2012 and the rule was "desktop PCs in classrooms, no staff laptops". We're now looking at mobile devices again (partly as a cheaper way to do an AV refresh - scrap the IWBs, use projectors or display screens with MS Wireless Display adapters in them, touch screen device with a pen for writing things "on the board") so are hopefully going to be pushing Surface for staff from next year.

 

Main points I'd say are:

 

- GDPR: You can't really enforce encryption of somebody's personal device, you can't set password policies etc. and you have no control over the device. Also if it's lost there's nothing you can do but hope it was encrypted. Managed laptops you'd ideally have a way to remote wipe them, and know that they were encrypted etc.

- Support: Much easier to support when everyone has the same kit.

- Fairness: If you're making people do work from home, and making them do that work on a computer, you should be providing them with a device. Some lower paid staff might not be able to afford to buy something decent to work from home. Why should they anyway? Doesn't just apply to teaching staff either.

- Actually increases efficiency in the classroom - assuming you're using a wireless method of presenting - as they already have their device, already logged on, possibly already with their files open ready to go. Don't have to wait for the PC to boot (if the last person turned it off), log on, wait for OneDrive etc to connect, wait for the programs you need to open.... etc.

 

The main reason I wanted to get rid of laptops back in 2012 when it was forced on us was the faff plugging VGA cables in every lesson meant half the laptops had faulty VGA ports, half the rooms had damaged VGA wall plates etc. - going to something wireless gets rid of this problem. Besides this I don't think I had that many issues with the laptops besides the odd one where a teacher had it hidden in a pile of text book/marking book which he slammed on the table when angry at a noisy class, that needed a new display and new HDD. But that's a rare case.

[paulkerton]

The world has dramatically changed when it comes to working. Providing a device for staff to work from home, that you can control, if they are expected to work from home, should be the default. Security wise, if anything.

My argument was always, you cannot make a device of your own choosing mandatory for people to buy and purchase at home for work use. You're penalising their wages by doing that.

 

I only have one Windows machine in my household, and that was provided by a previous employer that didn't want it back when I changed roles and told me to keep it. If I went to a workplace that was purely Apple, I would be furious if I was expected to pay for my own equipment. It's just not on, quite frankly and everyone working there would have the right to say "I'm not taking my work home with me" at that point. Could you imagine schools being able to operate if they did so!?

 

That being said, anyone who is given equipment from home should be signing an agreement that they're liable for accidental damage due to mistreatment. Many a pen slammed into a screen or "the dog walked over it" when they left it on the floor in my history!

 

We are a Chrome school and are slowly working on moving staff over from Windows to Chromebook in the next few years. 8.5 years of support guaranteed from Google, makes it a no brainer to look at investing slightly better on the price for better performance in the long term. Even at 8 years for a device being support, it would mean a laptop for a staff member at £600 would be getting a machine for about 40p per working day, let alone weekends and non-term time.

 

No brainer.

Edited November 16, 2020 by paulkerton

[Brimstone]

2 Primary Schools, every teacher issued with an iPad Pro 12.9, keyboard case and Apple Pencil. No other laptop or desktop

 

They do everything from teaching in the classroom, remote teaching (when self isolating) lesson planning, meeting notes, even running CPD webinars using them.

[jthompson]

SLT have has a policy in place even before I started 6 years ago that once exisiting staff laptops failed then they wouldnt be replaced.

 

I would start here and make the case that it's now 2020. The average school has moved on significantly in the last 5 to 10 years and leaning in to Microsoft and/or Google cloud platforms is now the norm. That would arguably be the case even without this year's epoch-defining pandemic. That means managed, mobile devices, because:

 

• your workforce is working from home on a daily basis
  
• data protection
  
• security
  

 

Don't let them confuse "everything is online" with "any device will do". Just because people can use their own device, that doesn't mean that they should.

 

I'd also agree with previous posts that breaking the cost of a computer down can help illustrate its value. A £600 Windows laptop that lasts for 5 years works out at £10 per user per month. Ask them how many hours a week the average teacher is working at home. That gives you the beginnings of a value proposition of buying a laptops over a PC that stays at school.

[sigma]

How is the school going to explain when pupil or parent data is exposed because a teacher was working on hacked unpatched Win 7 device with Office 2007 ?

[FN-GM]

What was the reason for putting this procedure in place? Find that root cause and overcome it.

 

Eg: The reliability and problems connecting to classroom screens.

 

Solution: Thunderbolt docks now make the seamless.