Stop students stealing mice

[adamyoung]

Anyone got any good ideas to stop students stealing mice?

 

Software thats alerts you when theyve been unplugged??????

[StewartKnight]

call me old fashioned, but shouldn't teachers stop students stealing mice?

[Dos_Box]

Simple. Find out who was logged on there last and then get the head to grip them and find out who stole it. They then get jumped up and down upon. Once this has happened a few times the word spreads and no more mice get stolen. Failing that a small cable tie around the end of the cable preventing the plug end from sliding though and attached to a hole in the PC chassis does the trick.

[Frazer]

We have room check sheets that staff have to sign at the end of every lesson - which doesnt always solve problems like that.

We tie-wrap the mouse/keyboard/monitor together @ the back of the computer to stop them running off with the mice. The 'trap door' for the mouse ball is glued shut.

[Netman]

Another way is to be bloody awkward about repairing any willful damage - just don't replace the mouse for two weeks. This will have the effect of waking staff up to stop things like that happening...

...or network camera (or dummy) in the room with a big poster saying that acts of vandalism and theft will be reported to the police with video evidence - that'll put them off!

[free4440273]

in my school (s) teachers are stealing the mice!

[russdev]

there was uni ner here whose replaced all the keyboards and mice with wireless ones then strapped them all down to the desk ????

 

Russ

[MkII]

Cable ties and optical mice here

[Dos_Box]

there was uni ner here whose replaced all the keyboards and mice with wireless ones then strapped them all down to the desk ????

 

Russ

 

How do you move the mouse then?

[Dos_Box]

Another way is to be bloody awkward about repairing any willful damage - just don't replace the mouse for two weeks. This will have the effect of waking staff up to stop things like that happening...

...or network camera (or dummy) in the room with a big poster saying that acts of vandalism and theft will be reported to the police with video evidence - that'll put them off!

 

That is quite a good point. many staff are quite blase (sp?) about this 'minor' theft and it is only us who get to see the mounting costs and inconvienience. If allowed to continue it also fiosters an attitude amongst the puipls that it is OK to abuse the IT equipment as there are plenty of spares and it is not really a crime at all as the school does not mind. IMHO vandalism and theft of IT equipment should be a priorty of teachers and SMT staff to nip in the bud.

[beeswax]

call me old fashioned, but shouldn't teachers stop students stealing mice?

 

It would seem that's not their job. One teacher in particular was getting through loads (99 in the space of 5 months - he blamed the supply teachers) and despite showing him the invoices for the new mice, and the fact that we'd been recording which classes they were going to, he wouldn't accept the figures, and neither would his head of department.

I also found that because of the cable ties, the mice were being separated from their usb/ps2 plugs. The techies can't be in the classes all the time, there are other jobs to do around the school, so in my opinion the teachers should be trying to keep an eye on thses things.

It can be very demoralising working in those sorts of conditions where even brand new equipment is quickly vandalised, and all the techies are doing is fire fighting. I'm lucky in that I found a job in a better behaved school, where teachers and techies work in harmony, we've never had a machine go down (all Windows 95) and the taps in the gents dispense cold beer. Nurse!

 

beeswax

[free4440273]

guess what? we don't have taps in our gents. i don't even think we have drains.

[free4440273]

...that was not a typo - i meant drains (not brains, although come to think of it...)

[Geoff]

Have you considered shock therapy?

[SpuffMonkey]

Marine grade stainless steel cable ties - which can't be cut with a pen knife or small scissors, optical (no mouse ball theft), USB (no crunching up the pins in the plug. I lieu of finding mice with steel armature cables, I buy the very cheapest I can find to that spec - £1.99 from Ash Distribution (up in the North East somewhere). As is stated - some teachers just don't seem to care - but then they end up teaching in the rooms with the crappiest equipment - karma baby

[free4440273]

geoff - shock sherapy to sort out the drains? never heard of it.

[Geoff]

Electrify the taps

 

But seriously, i think CCTV of some description is probably the best solution. It just depends if you can justify it costwise.

[ChrisH]

I cable tie the keyboard and mice to the monitor cable so instead of taking them they just break them...... I just need to get my system up and running to make it easy to tell who was sat there last and go from there.

[free4440273]

...head against a brick wall.

[mac_shinobi]

At kingswood - the computers have a lockable hole that you use to lock the case sides on to the base and we just basically use locks and put the cables through the lock and they cant take it cos the mouse, keyboard and if you want the monitor cables are put through them and because the lock hole or gap in the lock or w/e you want to call it is so small they cant pull the cable(s) through it especially with the mouse / keyboard PS2 connectors on the other end and if they really wanted it they would have to carry the whole computer around and I think carrying a computer around is a little bit obvious !!

[MkII]

Our kids managed to snap off USB connections - the tab inside the PC end. Ball mice were horrendous - kids and staff would try to swap them around, mashing the pins on the PS/2 connectors as they forced them in. We are in a rural area and have a few farmers sons [teaching and studying]. I've said before about kids eating through the cables and eating the rubber off the balls.

They can break the cable ties if they pull hard enough - but if you're that determined... and unsupervised...

We keep bringing up cctv too. I find checking logged in users is very unhelpful - kids deny everything and it has never got anywhere.

Funniest thing [in retrospect] ever to happen here... kids put penny chews in all the CD drives after they discovered the drives continuously open and shut after feeding.

[DMcCoy]

kids put penny chews in all the CD drives after they discovered the drives continuously open and shut after feeding.

 

So far I have found several 2p coins in cdroms that have the same effect, a 2p superglued to the top of a computer base unit, have had 30 fujitsu p300 cases smashed to bits, Almost 100 floppy drives destroyed, 30 cdrom drives broken. Monitors are nearly all crts and have survived well. Keyboards and mice probably run into the 100s each year.

[kingswood]

Well, I agree with all that has been said. The cost of fixing smashed systems, abused systems, replacing stolen mice and keyboards etc has forced my head of ICT (Curric) to close off access to IT rooms when not attended by staff who are supervising at all times. I don't blame him one bit. I think in the past year we have ordered and replaced again about 300 mice, 100 keyboards, probably in the region of 200 mouse mats, at least 20 systems and endless floppy drives and CD drives...

 

I'm not sure that there will ever be an end to it all really.

 

Paul :-(

[GrumbleDook]

In the worst rooms I hve warned the HoDs that I will bill them unless they make sure that the rooms are in good condition. If they claim it is supply teachers they have to prove that it was fine the lesson beforehand.

 

It works in most areas, but that is because we claim for the expensive USB optical wheel mice from M$ ...

[mac_shinobi]

Give them a stone age computer aka a calculator or better yet an abacus that way they can have admin rights, not have to worry about licensing, get rid of microsh1t I mean M$ and it dont matter if they steal em cos they dont cost much, if they really want computers, I think apple need to design an education version of macs that are vandilstic proof, bullet proof and can be locked down ( in the physical sense ie to the desk ) and all schools around the world would buy them and I am sure as time goes by and students get a go at em they will find out how to improve it and they will still make money and managing macs as I am sure Tony and Paul both know ( possibly others ) is a hell of a lot better.

 

Just my thought on it, although the first part of my comment @ calculators would have the one draw back of us not having jobs lol.

 

Anyways realisticly if apple did that, I think that would make life a lot easier.