Students using staff room PCs

[Sheridan]

Just getting a feel for how everyone handles this - I've always (in my previous and current roles) had policies in place to prevent students from logging on to staff PCs (in staff rooms, offices, classrooms etc) as there are plenty of desktops and laptops for them to use

 

However I'm getting a bit of pushback on this now - and I know the argument that the students are working in there supervised is rubbish, as I've previously observed them playing games etc so I'm still of the mind this should remain in place. Plus I would say there are good security reasons for not becoming comfortable with students using staff areas

 

How do you handle this, or do you let students login anywhere?

[BKGarry]

All Staff devices have restrictions preventing students login and visa versa (had issues with staff taking student devices to use).

My Mind also goes to, do you really want students in the staff room at all! That is a private space where things should be able to be discussed without worrying if little ears are listening.

 

My Argument was always, even though they shouldn't be able to load them, at the time, staff machines had the SIMS client and 4Matrix clients installed and the potential of someone putting something that could capture keystrokes, or someone leaving themselves logged in you could leave yourself open to a Data Breach.

[3s-gtech]

We used to have it so that student logons simply didn't work on those PCs. When we went to staff laptops this became moot, but the few desktops that remain are staff only through Group Policy.

[Sheridan]

3 minutes ago, BKGarry said:

All Staff devices have restrictions preventing students login and visa versa (had issues with staff taking student devices to use).

My Mind also goes to, do you really want students in the staff room at all! That is a private space where things should be able to be discussed without worrying if little ears are listening.

 

My Argument was always, even though they shouldn't be able to load them, at the time, staff machines had the SIMS client and 4Matrix clients installed and the potential of someone putting something that could capture keystrokes, or someone leaving themselves logged in you could leave yourself open to a Data Breach.

This is my mind - students shouldn't really be allowed to be in staff rooms - things have maybe been a bit lax here in the past regarding this. In some cases I've provided a spare laptop for them to use but its a pretty hard thing to justify

Edited October 13, 2025 by Sheridan

[pete]

No, it's a staff area with staff things being discussed / on the walls.  It's not reasonable to put students in there.

[Rob_D]

Never put anything in place here. Not really got a problem with a student logging into the teacher/IWB pc in classrooms, and that students shouldn't be in staff work rooms (or break rooms) isn't realy an IT issue, at least until they put access control on the staff work room doors.

[NegativeKillDeath]

Had it set up that students can't log in to staff PCs. Rationale was that if you see a student using a staff PC you would know that the teacher hadn't locked it and could take appropriate action. 

[mavhc]

If your computers are set up securely there's no technical reason.

 

One problem might be filtering not detecting the correct user. Main reason to block it is to discourage staff from doing the things they're probably not supposed to do, bring students into the staffroom

[Sheridan]

4 minutes ago, NegativeKillDeath said:

Had it set up that students can't log in to staff PCs. Rationale was that if you see a student using a staff PC you would know that the teacher hadn't locked it and could take appropriate action. 

That's a good point - as well all know staff like to let the 'good' kids use their logins 🤦‍♂️

[psydii]

I'm more bothered by staff logging on to student devices. "Well, no you can't log on to the  MIS from there, oh and by the way senso tells me what you are typing, so maybe don't."