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I replied to this earlier in another post, but I'll speak as a small-district IT director (at in Bishop, CA).

In our districts, Macs do not have lower TCO (as nebulous as that term is) compared to our PCs. The reason is simple - Norton Ghost. Our largest manpower sink is when a classroom computer gets hosed completely, and requires a clean install. With Norton Ghost, we re-image the drive in MINUTES, from anywhere on my network. I can VNC to our server, re-cast the Ghost image to the proper computer, and voila! The classroom computer is back online.

This is, of course, our last resort, but it does make centralized managment simpler for very serious problems. Additionally, if you aren't familiar with Active Directory, you can tweak pretty much every OS feature through it, and roll out different profiles on a per-user basis. This is excellent when teachers and students use the same classroom computers. Each profile can be roaming, so that teachers can work on their gradebook software on any computer on our campuses, or the students can get their documents from the same "My Documents" folder because they're all redirected to network shares by user. Cool stuff, and for a staff one one (me), it rocks.

I have previewed the Apple OS X server hardware and software (it was sent free to me by Apple, for evaluation), and it wasn't as tweakable, and I never did find a Norton Ghost equivalent for Apple OS.

Just my two cents.

We recently installed enough new computers in OUR middle school (in Bishop, CA to lower the student-to-computer ratio to 10-1.

When making the platform decision, the ability to quickly restore services if any given desktop got hosed was absolutely critical.

Using Norton Ghost, we can *immediately* re-cast the ghost image to any computer on the LAN, and restore the computer to pristine condition. This is not client-based, and can be done from remote.

Using the Active Directory for installation of redirected student folders, setting permissions on a per-user basis, locking down some desktop components, allow roaming profiles, and remote desktop management keeps our staff level manageable. This is done using, well, me.

Manpower required is THE determining factor when analyzing platform requirements. Sure, there are zealots for pretty much any OS choice, and Mac zealots will swear by their platform, and Linux zealots will cry out for how cheap their platform is, but the fact is that I have myself, one part-time network manager, and two after-school student workers to manage over 500 workstations on three physcially disparate campuses. It works well, because we automate almost everything, and despite some clear anti-MS bias here at Slashdot, Active Directory works great for remotely managing desktops to the nth degree, all from one location.

Norton Ghost is a godsend when dealing with hosed machines that would take hours for a technician to reformat and rebuild manually. It works from remote, and it works flawlessly. In combination with realVNC and Active Directory (to lockdown the app itself), we can remotely view workstations and troubleshoot from any other workstation. This is great when we get a call from one campus, but we're on another.

Just thought I'd give the perspective of a public school IT Director here in California.

Share and Enjoy,

Joe Griego
Bishop Union Elementary School District
Bishop Joint Union High School District

I have to point out to the readership that ALL public schools are moving toward this model of instant accountability.\ Here at Bishop Elementary and Bishop Union High School in Inyo County, California, we will be rolling out a very similar system, whereby parents and students will have instant access to their attendance (including tardies, absences, the whole schmeer), grades, discipline records, standardized test scores, and homeowrk. Most school administration software (Aeries, SASI XP, etc.) allow an online component based on passworded security to give parents and teachers access to this information. The driver for this is increased accountability for public schools. This is not a bad thing. Parents will be able to see instantly if their child blew a test, or if they're struggling with a particular section during a course. The key is NOT to make a student's life "a living hell" but rather to get parents and teachers to support students when they're struggling, and to praise them when they're doing well. It's so common-sense that most *involved* parents will yawn, because they ALREADY DO THIS by talking with their children's teachers, talking with school administrators, and talking with their kids. But hey, putting it on the web, that's so newfangled that people get all worked up about it. I say, get used to it. With the federal No Child Left Behind act now law, school districts throughout the country will be making more and more information available online for parents and teachers to show their progress, or lack thereof. Joe Griego Director, Information Technology Bishop Union Elementary/High School Districts Inyo County, California

We offer several online classes here at Bishop High School in Bishop, CA. We had to carefully pre-screen students, and our experience has shown that while online classes are an excellent opportunity for rural or small schools to offer curriculum they otherwise could not, there are drawbacks.

Specifically, the largest complaint was that there is no immediate feedback. Most online courses require logging in, reading lessons, and taking tests. There is little opportunity to ask the "online teacher" spontaneous questions. Most require submitting questions via email, and we've found that if you don't phrase the question properly, the responses can be tangential, or inapplicable.

Also, students MUST be self-motivated. You will set your child up for failure if they get behind in lessons. It is very tempting to put off online lessons because of the "I can read/download it later" syndrome. Parents MUST enforce the required homework and reading. There is no substitute for this at all.

Finally, the on-site "liasion" (usually a certificated teacher) is a crucial link. If a test needs to be faxed in by midnight, that teacher had better be willing to get calls from desperate students who flaked on their test until 11:59pm! This happens, and special dedication is required.

Hope this helps. Please feel free to email or post if you've got specific questions about our online curriculum, and past experience.

>Are these licensed copies of games that are >being played?

Yes, of course.

>If so, who paid for them?

I did, which renders the rest of your concern moot.

>Has the school board and superintendant been >made aware of the possible repercussions of this >activity?

Yes, of course they have. It is impossible to sponsor a school sanctioned activity without administration's approval.

>Are these games installed only for the night and >then uninstalled to prevent their usage during >non-sanctioned times?

No. The nice thing about NTFS is that you can assign permissions to directories and subdirectories by account. We set the permissions on the game directories so that only the one specified gaming account (we called it "gamer") can even get to them. And since you can't log into the machine without a valid account, there's really no way to play it on those machines unless the gamer account is logged in. And we disable that account except on Game Nights! Neat, huh?

>What kind of supervision is there? Is the ratio >of certified teachers to students monitored?

It is supervised by myself (the Dir. of IT), and by my Network Manager, Mr. Norcross. Our district requires adult supervision of sanctioned events by staff. I am a confidential classified employee (school district workers will know what that means).

>How many hourly school employees are there >earning overtime and taking away from the >school's budget?

Um, none. I volunteer my time for Game Night activities, as does Mr. Norcross. Game Nights happen on a Friday evening, begin at 5pm, and go until we get tired (usually around 1-2am)

>Also, how much of your support team's time is >spent preparing for and recovering from game >night, as opposed to actually improving >productivity?

Support team? Well, I lead the LAN Admin class here at Bishop High, and there are five students in that class. They install, configure, and set up security for Game Night (under my supervision, of course).

As for how much time to recover, well there really isn't any. The LAN Admin students have installed the software during the LAN Admin class, and after school. The Game Night itself doesn't start until 5pm, after my work day is over, so it's unpaid time for me anyway.

But don't think it's a huge sacrifice. I enjoy Game Night, and you should stay tuned for next year's events. We always post Game Night events on the homepage (http://www.buhs.k12.ca.us).

Joe Griego Dir., I.T. Bishop Union High School Bishop, CA http://www.buhs.k12.ca.us

If you're in a California school district, I'd recommend the GAMUT software. It's a monthly subscription service with legal policies and sample language for every item the California Education Code. Works great - just pick and choose the policies you like, tweak them for your district, and put them on the next school board agenda for approval. Once that's done, you introduce the policy to the staff. If you're the Director of IT, you're already in administration and you're all set. If you're not in administration, then present the issues to your superintendent, and get her support. Bring it up at the next staff meeting, if you must. Once the policy is in place, and teachers understand the issues (bandwidth, copyright, liability, etc.), then see if that gentle method works. If not, then simply use network security to tighten things up. There are many resources online for free or cheap firewall solutions that can stop most P2P apps cold. At my district (http://www.buhs.k12.ca.us) we simply block the default servers for most P2P apps at firewall for standard port 80 traffic, and then block the default ports for Kazaa/morpheus/LimeWire/Bearshare/AudioGalaxy and the rest. Simple, effective, no whining involved. If teachers complain about the lack of P2P availability, refer to the written policy, have them specify the educational benefit of the service, and have your superintendent sign off on it. If she signs off, then you've done what you could, and be on your merry way. Email me directly if you'd like more specific practical solutions for a K-12 school. It's what I do for a living. Regards, Joe Griego Dir., I.T. Bishop Union Elementary and Bishop Union High school districts Bishop, CA Bishop High Bishop Elementary

So basically, it's ok for the letter writer to actually BE a prick, but not to call him one, based on his own idiotic words?

Hey, whatever. I'll just close by saying that if *I* got a letter like that guy wrote, I would have called him a prick, too, and I'm confident that the school board, once they read the letter, wouldn't have had a problem with that.

Regards,

Joe Griego
Bishop Union High School

Perhaps if your original message was professional, that would have been the case. Something as simple as:

"Hello! Hey, you may not be aware, but your mail server is an open relay, and spammers are using it to forward unwanted email using your resources. If you are aware, and need help fixing the problem, please drop me a line. Thanks."

I assure you that would have been orders of magnitude more effective than the whole you-have-an-open-relay-so-you-suck-and-I-rule vibe I got from the original mail to the poor guy. And accusing him of wasting tax dollars because he didn't know he had an open relay? Come on. He probably wouldn't have responded as a prick if he hadn't been treated as one.

Joe Griego
Bishop Union Elementary School District
Bishop Elementary
Bishop High School

Wow. Read your original letter, and I must admit - you ARE a prick. Your letter was condescending, self-aggrandizing (what was up with your bragging about the number of mail servers you block - does that get you chicks or something?), and rude.

As the IT Director for the Bishop Union Elementary school district, I'd probably send you a similar response if you sent a bitchy message as yours to Spencer, WI.

The bottome line - you were whiny, you didn't actually help (or offer to help) him, and you were rude. Just precisely how did you *expect* him to react? School administrators have enough work to do without having to deal with annoying strangers.

Sheesh.

Joe Griego
Dir., I.T.
Bishop Union Elementary, and Bishop Joint Union High School Districts
Bishop Elementary
Bishop High