jcollings

Because I believe that it will do more good than harm. I think the police do an exceptional and outstanding job in this country on the whole and if they need my DNA to make that job a little easier then I don't mind.

That could happen with or without DNA databses!

Yes and plenty of innocent people convicted before DNA so what does it matter? As for ID cards - so what if you had to carry one - makes no difference except to criminals. The "personal freedoms" I'd like to see are things like being able to walk down the street unaccosted, the right to park my car without it getting nicked/vandalised etc, the right to not get burgled - anything the police can do to help with this would be good - if having a dna database helps them catch criminals quicker so be it. I'm with Zak on this - it's only a problem if you have something to hide!

Just wish you could find me something up North!

Sadly here several of us have keys and alarm fobs etc so any one of a dozen folk could unlock if required.

Never used them so I can't comment however if Lancs Uni is commutable for you I can highly recommend them. I have been on many courses there and so have my team and the quality is excellent.

As I understand it if your school is closed to pupils for a strike only NUT members will be off. Everyone else will be required to attend.

I think I'd give them a brief overview of what you do but then focus on how you can work with them to make things better all round. You must have frustrations with them you need to air (with as positive a spin as possible). I would avoid too much tech stuff and concentrate more on talking about service levels, giving them a chance to explain what they feel would give them a better service. Remember that it will be the end of term and people are generally very tired by then so keep it short, focused and to the point. Also if you feel you are being attacked (don't know what your set up is like), keep cool and answer professionally.

I agree with you to a point but the bottom line is if a group of kids all get F in their GCSE it is unlikely to be our door that the heads comes knocking on. Sure we play a big part in the school but I've never been challenged cos my CVA score is rubbish etc.

I have a vague recollection of this issue a while back. I'm not in til Monday but I'll dig through my stuff and see if I can find anything.

Much as we are important the reality is we have no direct responsiblity for students or their education. In no way are we more responsible than teachers. Yes we should be paid well but the jobs are not the same. And i don't think my comment was pathetic - if you don't like the terms and conditons, pay etc of public sector work then move on - I did when I had a job I didn't like. More pathetic is the view that things like PPA are "paid coffee breaks"! The "13 weeks off, finish at 3.30" is Sun reader mentality!

To be fair Google could answer loads of questions posted on here but the forum exists for us to check things out with each other. I don't think any of us should have a problem with that.

PPA/NCT; paid coffee breaks - you have to be joking - I could hand on heart say I would find very few of our staff having a coffee break during this time. Most genuinely use this time to do school work. E.g A Head of Year is on PPA/NCT, incident happens - they are dealing with that. A 50 minute period soon disappears up the arse of misbehaviour as one colleague said. An hour for lunch - again I know virtually no staff here who have that - most are running clubs, on duty or chasing their arse on some other errand. I think as others have said we need to be fair here. It is a tough job. Those that complain should perhaps consider changing careers and becoming teachers if it's such a doddle. I know I wouldn't swap!

I only use it to log in to my work desktop PC - I control the servers via RDP from that. Can't say I've noticed any speed issues.

I was just about to say the same - I live in Kendal it's feckin dear here to.

Another vote for logmein - I have it on my work PC and just control that from home to access servers etc.

I have to agree with you. I'm not saying all teachers do this but certainly the good ones do and I think that's the majority. We all know annoying staff who rub us up the wrong way but teaching day in day out - 5 days a week is bl**dy hard work and it's a different kind of work than we do. I also know nurses and police etc work hard to and don't get the hols but that's not the point. I don't think the current pay claim is sensible or just but let's not pretend they don't work hard. We want well paid, motivated teachers who care about what they do teaching our kids and for that we need to pay them well.

True but our terminal server only has 4Gb and supports 60 odd clients without too much hassle. @ linescanner - have to say I disagree. We found it really easy to setup and get working. We don't use Citrix or anything - just a vanilla system using old PC's and thinstation. All seems to trundle along nicely. Few new monitors/keyboards/mice and rooms look shiny and new and runs pretty quick. Saving us a fortune.

The first thing I would do is talk to your employer, perhaps during your appraisal and discuss your desire to do some formal qualifications. Certainly here we provide extensive training to our IT technicians via one of the local unis. We are lucky that Lancaster Uni provide excellent value for money training and are on the doorstep. We have paid for them all through numerous courses leading to Foundation Degrees. Not sure how your school stands on this but we feel it is essential to fund this training.

But the 24th April *is* in term time isn't it? It certainly is here. Just 'cos the kids aren't in due to a strike doesn't mean it isn't term time

Think we may well be required to work even if the teachers strike.

Fair point.

We use thinstation on old PC's. We often replace the CRT with a flat screen and new mouse to give the room a spruce up and we use Windows 2003 terminal server. We have a cheapo server that supports around 60 clients. We tend to use it in rooms that are pretty much using Office + the Internet. I love it but do feel we will use a mixed economy of fat and thin for the forseeable.

I just don't understand situations like this - as network manager surely you decide if it's viable to trial something not the dep head. Staff come to me asking to trial stuff but I decide if we can do it or not.

I installed it on our terminal server and it works a treat. Haven't had advice to the contrary from Capita.