Do you send IT Support newsletters?

[Edu-IT]

Just wondering how many of you send IT Support newsletters to school staff to let them know what's going on etc, and if so, how often and do you find this worthwhile doing?

 

Edit: If you answered yes then do you send it within an email (HTML) or as a PDF attachment?

[Crispin]

Strange you should mention this. We're currently getting our newly started apprentice to mock up some ideas for an IT bulletin.

 

We're thinking things like:

 

Top Tips

Recent Changes

Training opportunities

Maintenance schedules

 

We were actually considering using paper as some staff are more likely to actually read it.

[SYNACK]

I make small posters to hang around the school with shocking propaganda instead, stuff like "You Can Check Your Email From Home Like This" or our school Virus checkers warnings look like this "{cue giant picture of AV screenshot}". This seems to get the important messages across if only by subliminal messaging.

 

Our staff get plenty of email and paper thrown at them already but wallpaper the common areas with appropriate propaganda and they seem to absorb it. At least in small doses.

[Edu-IT]

I'm thinking that there will be people that won't read it, but that is their choice. It's a useful way of getting messages out there and is a bit more interesting than an email/helpdesk notice.

 

I am also not suggesting that this would be a daily thing; monthly would suffice I think.

[RabbieBurns]

we only send out major announcements via mass email to all staff.. Like, server downtime, policies changing etc, shutdownertron deployment, etc..

 

Not a chatty hi this is what we did this week type email.

[ticker]

we did this at my pervious school, it a was monthly ICT bulletin that went out with the normal staff briefing and it went down really well with staff who could see what we were doing, developments, info and that sort of thing.

I would like to start it here but with only two of us haven’t enough time.

[broc]

I post items in our E-staffroom 'notice board' on our Learning Gateway.... I don't think many people bother to read them though

 

We do send emails to all staff for other things too; they get ignored as well.

[pete]

Nope. It won't get read. We use small, bite-sized chunks on the noticeboard in staffroom. Important stuff is communicated orally at morning briefings.

 

I do ensure $bosses know when we're being particularly awesome though and $successful_projects get announced at briefings.

[Mr.Ben]

I write them once a term to highlight new programs or major changes in policy.

 

I don't think anyone reads them though, but it's a box ticked for the ICT Mark!

[Pottsey]

No, like others I send out a short email if it’s something major. Sometimes mostly when its last minute I go into morning briefings.

[elsiegee40]

I have a board in the staff room that I use and I invade the staff meetings if it's important.

 

All newsletter attachments and parent mails sent out here go in pdf format.

[Iain.Faulkner]

This is something we used to do at my last school, and was well appreciated by staff as the majority enjoy being kept in the loop.

 

Ours took the form of an "IT Update" and we sent it out on a half term basis on the first day back after the shutdown. The Update would normally be outlining the work done during the shutdown period, as well as any work that would likely be carried out during the next half term.

 

It's something I am going to try and implement at my current school, as communication between us as a department and the rest of the school is poor to say the least.

[sidewinder]

Being that no-one reads the vitally important emails we send out about downtime etc ("you never told me the network would be down") - no, it would be pointless

 

There are regular emails about large changes to the network or software, but again I doubt many read them

[bossman]

@all:

 

used to inform staff all the time of changes but as they don't see the actual events happening and as I try to make it as seamless as possible the staff don't seem too interested only when they themselves want something does it become a priority.

 

I am looking at running a presentation to put over how complex networks have become and how the end user is impacted by changes to that infrastructure (or not) and all the transparency behind the scenes.

 

Don't want to bore them so will have to add a little comedy into it without upsetting the little darlings.

[john]

Just print Chris's article off and show them that, its aimed at the right level so there is a good chance they will understand it

 

I do find diagrams help though, my diagram of what Virtualisation is and how it works was a simple HP Server with cubes with Windows sat on top of it and it seemed to get the message across nicely

 

I don't have time to do one, we thought about making it a half termly one instead but then still never had the time, may get my techy to look at doing it, but all the things we do in the main at present are behind the scenes so there not as obvious to them any more, they wouldn't get excited over HP Proliants, Sun SANs and Fibre Optics really would they?

[joe90bass]

I send out an email with what's happening, planned downtime, etc. I aim for monthly but if need be I do more often. I'm guessing people do read it, as I had a complaint one was a bit long and could I bullet point it in future!

 

I just sent out a tips e-mail yesterday, in future though I may put a tip a week in our daily notice, more likely to get read that way!

[danrhodes]

Tip 1 for teachers - use common sense more frequently!

[webman]

Tip 1 for teachers - use common sense more frequently!

 

Pre-requisites: have common sense.

[bossman]

I send out an email with what's happening, planned downtime, etc.

 

Downtime in their time wow your chancing your arm hehe!!

 

We get the downtime fairies to do it and get them to do it through the night when they are all fast asleep in their beds.

[joe90bass]

Downtime in their time wow your chancing your arm hehe!!

 

We get the downtime fairies to do it and get them to do it through the night when they are all fast asleep in their beds.

 

I do try and do reboots, etc on the weekend, but I usually forget It's rare I do reboot during the school day, it's usually 4:00 on a Friday and there are very few teachers around then!! If I do reboot in the day it tends to be for something serious like a misbehaving server that if it doesn't get rebooted will fall over anyway, or when I've had toruble with backup exec and only a reboot seems to fix it! And these reboots get done at break or lunchtime - with notice.

[maniac]

Thought about it, but as staff never read the e-mails I send them anyway it seems pointless. I ocassionaly get items put on the weekly bulletin senior management send out.

[mossj]

We send a paragraph or two with the normal weekly staff newsletter...

 

There are some staff that we will never see (night-porters etc), yet the changes in processes and the projects we are developing could impact them.

 

We also update the director, weekly on the progress of all projects.

[adamchapman]

Just sent my first one after reading this gave me the idea!

Not sure how to make it interesting enough so that people will read it though.... after all are the end users actually bothered what we get up to? - as half the time the work we do doesn't affect them directly

[featured_spectre]

Send out once a fortnight covering tasks that need to be done, tasks that are in th process if being done and call log response times etc. Once a half term I inform them of all upcoming projects for the term ahead such as email migration etc.

[_Adam_]

"You send too many emails", "You do not send enough emails", "I don't understand your emails", "Your emails are too basic" and so on.

 

I do send emails as a way to communicate major changes or outages, but only really to cover me against unhappy staff members later on. I get a fair bit of "Oh I wasn't told..." which I just forward the email to them again showing they were. My tip, keep emails really really short and use other channels to get information across such as staff meetings - do a short announcement or short demo.