....and relax.....

[garethEds]

There is nothing better than the weekend after you send your last piece of coursework away. GCSE, AS and A-Level have all gone to the moderators after hours and hours of marking, standardising, marking again etc.

 

Now that it's all gone I can finally get out to the garden during the nice evenings instead of barricading myself into the study.

 

Year 11 have started their exams, Year 12 are in the middle of theirs and Year 13 are about to start. A bit of free time in work to look at network projects for the next half term - Hyper V being one of them.

 

It's the one time of year where having three job titles is good. It is the smooth that comes with the rough.

 

Summer's coming guys - let's all crack open a cider and enjoy the sun - just in case it leaves us.

 

Gareth

[witch]

Well done! I am sure you deserve a bit of a rest...

[garethEds]

Well done! I am sure you deserve a bit of a rest...

 

Thank you witch. Regardless of what people say about teachers, the last month of coursework is tough going - a lot of paperwork and chasing kids. I'm not moaning (before anyone starts on me).

 

Now it's time to switch hats and plan projects. What do me and @rich_tech have on the go......

 

1. 64bit Windows 7

2. HyperV

3. OneLan training for our admin staff

 

and some more that I cannot think of now. Two Magners in and it's time for bed

 

Gareth

[PotNoodleTech]

Oi stop slacking!!! Don't you have a couple of hundred reports to write Gazza?

[sonofsanta]

It's always an entertaining time of year spotting which teachers are on the final week and which have just had it. It's normally pretty obvious

 

There may be times of year when teachers are slacking off in comparison - say, I don't know, August - but I think it's made up in large part at this time of year. I certainly don't envy those who are spending every evening till midnight and all their weekends dealing with it.

 

Although how you manage doing teaching and network management I don't know - normally I'm winding up for the holidays just as the teachers are winding down, so you must be constantly on the run...!

[garethEds]

Oi stop slacking!!! Don't you have a couple of hundred reports to write Gazza?

 

You are indeed correct and I'm sat here at the moment writing year 9 reports. Year 7 are next week and Year 10 after half term.

 

I'm also prepping/improving my Moodle courses for September and preparing a Year 10 exam paper for next week.

 

I have a revision session tomorrow evening from 3:30 until 6 and over half term there is a revision session for Year 11 (10 - 3).

 

It's not all relaxing :-)

 

In addition I'm trying to finish the NAACE SRF for this year/next year.

 

Appreciate the fact that techies are ramping up as @sonofsanta mentions - I wonder what projects everyone has on the go. YOu ask how I manage it? @rich_tech is my wingman here and keeps everything running smoothly. Always helps to have someone to bounce ideas off.

 

The only issue I have is with being the only 'specialist' ICT/Computing teacher - nobody to bounce ideas off and no time to be innovative.

 

Gareth

[sparkeh]

Seriously Gareth, how on earth do you manage those three roles? One if enough for anybody :S

[garethEds]

Seriously Gareth, how on earth do you manage those three roles? One if enough for anybody :S

 

In all honesty we are a small school - 800kids with only 300 machines. Like I say @rich_tech does all of the technical work. I'm just the 'Manager' which really means - only decisions. I do occasionally help out with the servers (like when I broke MDT2012).

 

I'm a strong believer that sometimes the Network Manager needs to be someone who has had/is currently in the educations setup. I know this might be controversial here on Edugeek but being able to see both sides of the fence and understand what teachers need helps shape the network and helps me with my job - There is no communication issue between two seperate people if they were in those individual roles. (Did that make sense?) Although I do argue with myself a lot.

 

IT Coordination takes a back seat during the year until this half term - then I try and run around like a fool meeting staff and trainign them in what they need.

 

Head of ICT - That is the job I work hard for.

 

Gareth

[sparkeh]

I'm a strong believer that sometimes the Network Manager needs to be someone who has had/is currently in the educations setup. I know this might be controversial here on Edugeek but being able to see both sides of the fence and understand what teachers need helps shape the network and helps me with my job - There is no communication issue between two seperate people if they were in those individual roles. (Did that make sense?) Although I do argue with myself a lot.

No I think I agree with the sentiment of what you are saying. I believe that the direction of IT in the school should be guided by a combination of a senior leader with an overview of school teaching needs and a technical person to give advice on and achieve the school aims.

That's how it works here, the Deputy and the Network Manager (me) work closely on driving IT forward and it works well as I can't fully appreciate the T&L needs of the school and he can't fully appreciate the technical aspects of implementing those needs.

[gshaw]

Yup agree, IT teams can't only sit on the technical side these days. You need to have an appreciation of how the tech is being used in classes and the current and future direction of learning generally e.g. understanding why e-ILPs and e-Portfolios are important or how changes to funding might affect the courses and resources you use.

 

As for projects... middle of the year is our quieter time... usually when we're speccing up what we need from our end-of-year budgets. We then go out and buy it now we have the following for summer...

 

- Windows 7 upgrade, new mandatory profile setup etc for all teaching machines

- swap machines around so fastest units are in key areas, perform yearly checks \ repairs on Smartboard & projector setups

- additional suite of workstations, currently choosing between standard PCs or going down the VDI route

- configure and test our new Ruckus WLAN for RADIUS & Guest Access

- configure Palo Alto firewall and set up VLANs for Guest Access etc

- customise theme, test additional plugins and update training materials for Moodle 2.2 upgrade

- create POC Joomla site \ layout for SLT to decide if to move website away from our current all-in-one Moodle portal

 

Also during this time

 

- test Office 365 and decide where it fits with our network

- report on use of printers and move devices around based on usage and requirements... some replaced with MFPs

- tidy up server room and clear out old kit from server rack so it's nice and neat

 

Busy summer ahead!

[Pete10141748]

Take that well deserved rest while you can! Time for a few more Magners in there somewhere I'm sure

 

I've not got anything big planned for this summer (thank God!) after all the building work last year it'll be nice to be able to sort out all the little leftover things and then have a few weeks off to myself

[garethEds]

No I think I agree with the sentiment of what you are saying. I believe that the direction of IT in the school should be guided by a combination of a senior leader with an overview of school teaching needs and a technical person to give advice on and achieve the school aims.

That's how it works here, the Deputy and the Network Manager (me) work closely on driving IT forward and it works well as I can't fully appreciate the T&L needs of the school and he can't fully appreciate the technical aspects of implementing those needs.

 

I agree totally - but it's also important that if schools are in a situation where the techician reports to the ICT Coordinator that there needs to be mutual respect. Not all techies are educationally aware whilst not all ICT teachers/coordinators are technically aware. The big challenge is working together to provide an environment that encourages learning.

 

Pupils don't care about the politics which is why we just all have to work together to keep the systems chugging along.

 

Good work everyone - let's keep going.

 

Gareth

[garethEds]

- test Office 365 and decide where it fits with our network

 

I'm interested in some collaboration on this if you have the time. I currentle have a test account. I am considering moving our email to the cloud but it all depends on the LEA installing ADFS.

 

Gareth

[garethEds]

Take that well deserved rest while you can! Time for a few more Magners in there somewhere I'm sure

 

I've not got anything big planned for this summer (thank God!) after all the building work last year it'll be nice to be able to sort out all the little leftover things and then have a few weeks off to myself

 

Agree - sometimes those little things get neglected and build up. Good luck and have a chilled summer.

 

Gareth

[bodminman]

We've just started an ICT Steering Committee so that the curriculum side of things has regular constructive time with the technical side. It's been one of the most useful things we have ever done, honestly!

[garethEds]

We've just started an ICT Steering Committee so that the curriculum side of things has regular constructive time with the technical side. It's been one of the most useful things we have ever done, honestly!

 

Extremely important to get the pupils involved as well in any ICT Steering Group - even if they have their own group. Both ESTYN and OFSTED are in favour of pupil groups - especially if they are seen to be influencing school policy.

 

Gareth