Amusing Edugeek mention at conference

[sparkeh]

So I masqueraded as a teacher and attended the Future of Computing in Schools Conference (awesome to see Ian Livingstone give a key note).

 

Edugeek was mentioned as a good source of information but came with a health warning as apparently we can be mean to teachers

[sonofsanta]

Does that mean schools should come with a health warning for us, as teachers are mean to us in them?

 

/still somewhat bitter over a xmas card from the head of english to one of his technicians, thanking him for his "unjudgemental" IT support. Stupid meanieface.

[Andrew_C]

thanking him for his "unjudgemental" IT support.

It is a compliment. It just means you didn't call him a "lackwit-numbnuts" for summoning you each time he failed to find the "Any key"

[hardtailstar]

Our teachers/TA's are already getting presents and boasting...... what fun the next week will be!!

[sparkeh]

Does that mean schools should come with a health warning for us, as teachers are mean to us in them?

 

Ha, wish I had thought of that at the time

[X-13]

Edugeek was mentioned as a good source of information but came with a health warning as apparently we can be mean to teachers

 

You better have gone all Phoenix Wright on them.

 

[ATTACH=CONFIG]16314[/ATTACH]

Edited December 12, 2012 by X-13

[sparkeh]

I just reminded people that the TES forum is worse by far for teacher bashing

[Oaktech]

We aren't mean to anyone who turns up with a civil tongue and an ounce of common sense... Wait... I see the problem!

[GrumbleDook]

So I masqueraded as a teacher and attended the Future of Computing in Schools Conference (awesome to see Ian Livingstone give a key note).

 

Edugeek was mentioned as a good source of information but came with a health warning as apparently we can be mean to teachers

 

I don't even have to ask you who it was who would have said that (and he is a member here!)

[Ephelyon]

Masquerading as a teacher, you say... I might have to try that one sometime!

 

Not the worst thing I've heard at a conference... "IT Technicians just want an easy life" (from NAACE) would have to take first prize in my list I think. They didn't get away with it though, cos I woz dere and woz like all up in dere face (or not)... xD

 

On a side note, and not that you'd expect any different to be fair, I still get that from random other folk when they ask me what I do. I tell them I "work in a school" - "oh - what do you teach?"...

 

Hmmm... we have about 110 staff, about 45 of whom are teachers... but as I say, joking aside, I guess that's not obvious to people outside the education sector and it doesn't bother me really.

[Earthling]

Masquerading as a teacher, you say... I might have to try that one sometime!

 

"IT Technicians just want an easy life" (from NAACE) would have to take first prize in my list I think. .

 

Easy life like what?

 

Three months off per year, maybe? Protected 'professional' status? Protected 'free-time' during a working day? And all the other stuff that teachers get that I don't even know about?

 

Or maybe we'd like teachers to NOT leave their brains in the staff-room when they teach in a computer room. That would be easier.

 

Or for them to ask us before they buy, magpie-like, the latest bit of shiney-shiney then bring it to us saying 'I can't find Word on this'. That would be easier, too.

 

Or to ask us about the latest bit of 'Wonderful-do-it-all-makes-you-a-better-teacher-in-two-easy-clicks' software, before they bring it to us saying 'It says on the box it's not supported on Terminal Services so can you make it work on the thin-clients?'. I kid you not with that one, but that would be easier, too.

 

[tmcd35]

"IT Technicians just want an easy life" (from NAACE)

 

Personally I'd say that's true. Just because I want something doesn't mean I'm gonna get though...

[soveryapt]

Personally I'd say that's true. Just because I want something doesn't mean I'm gonna get though...

 

I'm sure any of us would agree with that .. if we wanted an easy life, it wouldn't be educational IT support we were in .. lol ..

[Ephelyon]

And all the other stuff that teachers get that I don't even know about?

 

I'd ask the STRB.

 

The context was the part of their presentation that considered the trend away from "locked down" to "managed" systems (interesting terminology as I'd personally call them "managed" and "unmanaged" respectively). The speaker referred to why we block things (not just in terms of web filtering but also e.g. blocking EXE files running from CDs / USB sticks, other GPO restrictions etc., not that they put it in those terms of course). The comment was that this was typically associated with the IT Technician who wants an easier life, whereas it would be better to let pupils make the mistakes and then mitigate afterwards through education and sanctions. Presumably this speaker didn't know that running a 0-day exploit payload against a SIMS server you haven't had time to patch yet and then finding out where all the teachers live is unfortunately a very real possibility. Or run a silent keylogger that doesn't require admin rights. Or display a fake logon box that doesn't either. Or that the reason I restrict the ability to e.g. search AD is so that an attacker can't obtain a list of usernames to start guessing passwords from.

 

No, we know the rest of you don't know things like that... that's why we do it. The principle of least privilege has been around for nearly four decades I'm afraid. Comes back to my overall take on IT risk management in education: where the potential consequence arising is significant, immediate and permanent, then we block. Where it is not, then we educate.

 

A questioner then piped up during the following Q&A session wanting to know more (I forget exactly what now)... and the same comment came up again. What annoyed me the most is that I wasn't the only IT Manager present (though there weren't many)... and I got the impression that none of the rest would've said anything if I hadn't.

 

If we wanted an easy life, it wouldn't be educational IT support we were in.

 

Don't worry, I said that too!

Edited December 12, 2012 by Ephelyon

[sted]

but surely The principle of least privilege isnt confined to just it its life and good sense. for example you need a driving licence to legally drive a car and that requires you to be 17 how is admin rights any different? you dont let 4 year olds loose with a 18 wheeler and you dont let random peeps loose with enterprise admin credentials ignoring the fact they could see everyone elses files so it has dpa issues someone needs to be in control. ive less issue with local admin i give teachers that to their laptops the flipside is if they break it i just flatten it dont attempt to retrieve data it should be synced anything in odd locations tough

[sparkeh]

I must admit I found listening to a talk aimed at teachers very interesting as obviously they are our end users and are coming at things from a different angle.

 

I think some of the contents of the talk highlighted the gulf in understanding between teacher and tech that needs to be bridged to move IT in schools forward. The speaker made a comment that (and this is paraphrased) it was more important to be able to show some content from a memory stick with a virus than block it, (quote) "My memory stick has a virus? So what?" This was particularly interesting as the talk was about safety

I suspect that this wasn't a true reflection of the speaker's attitude and more of a play to the (teacher) audience but both sides can take something away from this comment.

 

Teachers can take away that there is a world outside there classroom and techs have a responsibility to keep all their users safe.

Techs can take away that teachers need to be able to do their job in the best way possible (within sensible limits - the virus example is not a good one )

 

I have been to many tech conferences and one teacher conference, the thing that struck me was how much better is would be for teachers and tech to attend IT conferences together with material aimed at both. I attended with the Deputy Head and we haven't stopped chatting over ideas since. I feel it would have been harder to start putting new ideas into practice without the input of both tech and curriculum knowledge.

[Ephelyon]

Couldn't agree more.

[James_C]

Try having an IT director who is also a teacher.

 

I think he forgets which hat he has on sometimes.

Edited December 13, 2012 by James_C

[Ephelyon]

Could be an issue. For a senior position like that, teacher route or techie route? My personal view is that the techie route is really a must, but only after significant experience of working alongside teachers and a proven track record of actually being useful.

[sparkeh]

Try having an IT director who is also a teacher.

 

I think he forgets which hat he has on sometimes.

That's a tough one.

 

In schools I am not am not keen on one person (teacher or tech) having an overall position like that. For me, moving IT forward in education is about collaboration between educational ideas and the reality of implementing it.

I like the way things work here, not saying we are perfect by any means, but the Deputy takes a curriculum view, I take a tech view and we discuss both of our ideas to try and move forward.

[Ephelyon]

True, splitting the role in that sense can also work - in fact we do that here. The Head and I collaborate on strategy in the sense of merging "IT strategy" and "use of IT strategy" (which I don't consider to be the same thing), and we've recently set up (at my request) a strategic user group so that some of these issues can be considered more widely by the staff.

[GrumbleDook]

That's a tough one.

 

In schools I am not am not keen on one person (teacher or tech) having an overall position like that. For me, moving IT forward in education is about collaboration between educational ideas and the reality of implementing it.

I like the way things work here, not saying we are perfect by any means, but the Deputy takes a curriculum view, I take a tech view and we discuss both of our ideas to try and move forward.

 

In some places you need that single person for vision ... but the strategy is something that is prepared and delivered by a group ... it has to be for it to work.

 

Sometimes you do need a single voice ... an evangelist ... and if there is only a single person that has to do everything then they really do need to be able to balance all sides.

[James_C]

In some places you need that single person for vision ... but the strategy is something that is prepared and delivered by a group ... it has to be for it to work.

 

Sometimes you do need a single voice ... an evangelist ... and if there is only a single person that has to do everything then they really do need to be able to balance all sides.

 

Because he is a teacher I get the feeling he thinks he is the voice for them all, but yet when I talk to other teachers they have a very different view on things. He decideds what is best for them and doesnt really treat them like a customer and listen to what they are asking for. So that I dont take over this thread I may post this on a new thread as I would be interested on how I should deal with my thoughts on this.

Cheers

[penfold]

My other half works in a primary school and last week had a meeting where all teaching staff were introduced/trained on using IPads in work. From what I was told it was relating to what you could do and how to get the most of them and to engage the kids into the subject they teach. Apparently it was interesting but all based around what you can do using an IPad. By the time she had finished telling me I asked 2 simple questions relating to why an IPad over another device (as everything she had told me could be done on multiple platforms) and how are they going to be managed and she looked at me blank and answered she didn't know.

 

Now I like the fact that IT is being enbraced in schools, but I couldn't help thinking that although the meeting was providing teachers with ideas of what things could be done, they were missing a key area from a tech support point of view. I do think that with a single tech person there it could have been questioned if IPads would provide the best value for money or present alternatives or even question what happens when things go wrong?

 

From a tech support point of view you don't need to provide an opinion of which direction the curriculum should take, but I would think it would be wise to consult with the people who know the school's current status IT provision together with the cost (not just money) of introducing new devices/requirements. In the past I have worked with members of staff in order to push their lessons further by incorporating more IT but when it comes to whole curriculum changes it seems that IT support can often be forgotten about as a source of knowledge.

 

I would always say it is a good thing to have a view from the opposite side of the fence as sometimes it is far too easy to get caught up in assuming things are done because people are lazy rather than having a balanced view of why things are done in a certain way.

[GrumbleDook]

Because he is a teacher I get the feeling he thinks he is the voice for them all, but yet when I talk to other teachers they have a very different view on things. He decideds what is best for them and doesnt really treat them like a customer and listen to what they are asking for. So that I dont take over this thread I may post this on a new thread as I would be interested on how I should deal with my thoughts on this.

Cheers

 

Being honest ... I am aware that I can be like that as well at times ... and when you have a vision you can get caught up with making things other have said to you fit into how your mind thinks about things. Having a few others around you the help with the sanity checks is a *good thing*!