Podcast Series: Innovations in Education

Explore the full series of eSchool News podcasts hosted by Kevin Hogan—created to keep you on the cutting edge of innovations in education.

5 key network steps for supporting educational technology

Today’s K-12 students are coming to the classrooms toting three or more mobile devices, from smartphones and laptops to tablets and smart watches. Teachers are putting more of their educational content online and streaming it to their students, administrators are storing more student information in the cloud, and district officials are automating more of the schools’ operations. There is the Internet of Things, digital signage, and video being used to monitor cafeterias. Technology continues to shape the future of how we educate our children and operate our schools, from flipped classrooms to the use of augmented and virtual reality.

At the center of all this is the network, and more and more the wireless network. Where connectivity was once a nice luxury, it is now a must-have, and increasingly the focus of many school district CTOs is making sure that those networks are up 24 hours a day, seven days a week, and that they’re secure.

Here are five network issues that tech directors must focus on.…Read More

5 different ways IT directors handle student data privacy

Student data privacy is a hot-button issue. In the last five years, according to Amelia Vance, director of education privacy & policy counsel at the Future of Privacy Forum (FPF), over 600 bills on the topic have been introduced and 125 new laws have passed in about 40 states. “Unfortunately, the vast majority of those laws came with no resources, funding, or support to implement them. I give a lot of credit to the leading district CIOs and CTOs who have stepped up and fulfilled the promise of the laws,” says Vance, who also runs FERPA|Sherpa, the Education Privacy Resource Center that has loads of resources online.

Vance encourages district leaders to start by training every person in your district who has access to information about the importance of privacy and protecting that information. “Most of the issues that arise are because of human error,” she says. “Email attachments that shouldn’t be sent out get sent; web pages go live that shouldn’t; people forget to lock their computer.” Recently, she heard about a district that posted its school safety plans online before the school board meeting; no one noticed they included the private medical information of students and teachers who would need assistance in a school safety emergency.

In 2019, a lot of general privacy laws may pass that will unintentionally apply to schools. Vance suggests keeping an eye on any privacy bills that come up in your state because they may accidentally cover you and give you additional responsibilities. She says you can keep updated by Googling your state + consumer privacy act. You can also bookmark the FPF and FERPA|Sherpa websites, as they’ll be keeping track of the news.…Read More

5 things changing today’s CTO role

During ISTE 2016, a panel of CTOs and educators examined how changes in today’s schools and technologies are impacting the role of the traditional CTO

Chief technology officers (CTOs) in school districts juggle any number of demands relating to IT support, technology integration into classroom instruction, and future district technology plans. But as technology changes, and as the needs of students and teachers change, so does the role of the CTO.

A panel of CTOs, ed-tech specialists, and educators at ISTE 2016 in Denver, moderated by Jeremy Shorr, the director of innovation and education technology in Ohio’s Mentor Public Schools, explored some of the challenges that come along with those changes and shared their best practices for ensuring that technology continues to meet the needs of teaching and learning throughout those changes.

Blended learning…Read More

6 things keeping your CTO up at night

What CTOs are struggling with, and how teachers and admins can be part of the problem, and the solution

cto-nightShort-staffed, budget-beleaguered tech departments have a lot on their plates right now as they juggle schools with more devices and applications than ever before with the need to keep security tight.

This year’s TCEA Convention and Exposition in Austin, Texas featured a panel session with a number of chief technology officers (CTOs), who discussed the state of education and technology from their perspective.

We recently spoke with a handful of CTOs, including panel members, who shared the key challenges they are currently facing, and offered up some solutions for handling these obstacles.…Read More