3/20/07

OTES Technology Committee
Present: Jef Hamlin, Matt Cyr, Lynn Lowell, Vicki Bergeron, Becky Smith, Bernie Lucas, Cathy Lucas, Jeanna Tuell

1. The District Tech. Committee has recently divided into two different committees. One is the Technology Curriculum Committee, chaired by Judy Pusey; and the other is the IT Committee chaired by Jef Hamlin. I will serve on both of those
committees, as well as continue to chair the OTES Tech. Committee, but we are hoping to find other representation at the district level. Please send Matt an email if you are interested in joining one of the district level committees.

2. Digital Microscopes are housed in the library—Thanks Lynn!!

3. Storing “picture” cameras……these will be bar coded, and assigned exactly the way they currently are…..we’ll just use these bar codes to collect them at the end of the year.

4. Pros and cons of how IT has been going thus far at OTES, and News from Jef!!!
*If you have a problem, send it to [ mailto:otsdhelpdesk@otsd.org ]otsdhelpdesk@otsd.org
and, cc it to [ mailto:mattcyr@otsd.org ]mattcyr@otsd.org . If it is something that Matt knows how to fix, he’ll come and do it, and “call off” helpdesk.
*The new policy is that helpdesk will respond to every helpdesk email within one day (24 hours).
*Don’t be offended if helpdesk responds with questions, or respond by letting you know it may take a few days to get back to you.
*Please give as much information as possible, and specifically how the technical issue effects your instruction.
*If you don’t get a response within a day, call Jef’s cel phone at 557-9019….it is very likely that it is an e-mail time delay (helpdesk is not ignoring you).
*BESS was reset, so if you are not crazy if a site that formerly worked is now blocked. To have this changed, use the BESS feature to notify administrator to have it changed….this will send an email to Tim, and he usually can fix it within a few hours. In your explanation, simply state that it is a site that previously worked before BESS was reset.
-Our new Exchange e-mail server will give us a lot of new resources, such as web-based sign-outs for the COWS, OTES news groups, work folders, etc…..this is something we’ll be using next year.
-We are switching to Web2School as our grading program soon. (No more Pinnacle) This will save the district a lot of money; and, we are already using Web2School for our student data, so it won’t be that big of a deal to switch. There will be training time for people to learn how to use Web2School….it is VERY similar to what you are already doing….just looks different (Ford vs. Chevy).

5. Supplies?? Anything needed before the end of the year?
-Battery Chargers/Batteries
-Printing 5th Grade Yearbooks (Jef Hamlin thinks there is a place that can print for $.40 per year.) Or, if the 5th grade can get the yearbook pages prepared in advance, we can print the pages somewhere in the district.
-CD’s and DVD’s
-USB flash drives……let Matt know if you need another..we can get you a 1GB

6. Future meeting date/time/agenda items
a. Tuesday, April 24, 2:45 Conference Room