http://www.hopkinsschools.org/servicesdepartments/technology-media/strategic-planning

A recent discussion on the Apple listserv was around Tech Plans. I’ve posted a link to the plan for Hopkins Public Schools.

The link below may not work so here is the site:  http://www.watchknow.org/
SMART Boards and WatchKnow Video Library
Posted: 30 Mar 2011 01:34 PM PDT
In all my workshops, I find that I never miss an opportunity to recommend the WatchKnow website for finding educational videos for the classroom. This is also a great place to locate videos that you may want to download and incorporate into a Notebook lesson file.

This site is maintained by the users and organized in a way that can really help teachers find relevant videos for the classroom. I also like the rating system that is used to help teachers make a educated decision on what videos to review.

You’ll want to start searching through the site right away once you see it so please go there right now and take a look. When you’re done, make sure you look at all the things you can do with WatchKnow by watching their introductory video.

Here is the video if you want more information now:

If you can’t view the video here, you may have YouTube blocked. Click Here to go directly to the YouTube video.

Please don’t forget to share this incredible resource with the teachers at your school.

Sharing Is Caring!

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This came a little too late!

After all I’ve heard and experienced about the user-friendliness of the Mac OS, I never imagined my Mac would allow me to do such a thing!  I was trying to copy files from one external hard drive to another, separating my work files from my personal ones.  I had trouble with a few that were Fat32 file size limitation issues, so I decided mid-way through the process I should re-format the school drive so I could get those files onto it.  In the process of moving what I had already copied BACK to my own drive, I moved a folder, chose Replace, and didn’t think twice.  Little did I know, the folder/copy “Replace” action on a Mac OS is VERY different from Windows!  And in an instant, it was all gone.  Everything I’ve ever captured on my Mac.  Gone.  I tried Undo when I first noticed it, but it was already too late.

I asked my husband who has much more experience with the Mac OS, and he seemed confused at first.  He, in contrast, didn’t know the Replace action was different either.  Unfortunately for me, though, had I made the mistake as a Mac user switching to Windows as he would have, it would not have had this devastating result.

So, a lesson learned.  For all you Windows users out there, beware — if you click Replace when copying a folder, the old folder is wiped out and truly replaced with what you copy!

What I found out: The eDiscovery laws were passed by the Supreme Court of the US in December 2006. This law states that all school districts need to have an archive of email and instant message (IM) conversations.  They left how long this information needs to be archived to the states. Minnesota requires email (with attachments) and IM conversations be kept for 3 years.To read about relevant information for eDiscovery laws go to: ediscoverylaw.com. To see a full PDF file on Minnesota’s laws go to Click Here.

Private Schools: You may be asking, we’re a private school do we still have to comply? Private schools were specifically addressed in the group discussion. It was stated that since private school teachers are still public officials the private school system would need to comply.

What to do? As a group there were a few ideas on what to do being discussed.
- The first option was to sit and wait. There were a few schools that are going to wait and see what happens to another school in an eDiscovery case. At this time there is little enforcement of the eDiscovery law. On top of that court cases involving the eDiscovery law are not wide spread.  They would then implement a solution based on a court ruling. This may not work for you if you’re the first eDiscovery case in Minnesota.
- The second option was to purchase an in-house message archiver. Message archivers can be purchased from most resellers (CDWG and Cadan Computers carry them). A Barracuda Archiver with 1 year of maintenance and updates will run you about $6,000. There are also software archivers that reside on your mail server. These options include the GFI mail archiver. The GFI mail archiver sells for about $2,000 and has a reoccurring annual maintenance fee.
- The final option was to use an online service to archive messages. Gaggle.net will archive messages off of many email systems (including Exchange server and gmail) for around $7 per email box. This covers the collection of new data and keeping it for 1 year. To keep emails for more than 1 year you will need to pay an extra $2 per box. As you can see Gaggle.net would be $7 for the 1st year, $9 for the 2nd, $11 for the 3rd year per email address. Rumor has it that gmail has an option to archive in it’s apps for education but I am not officially aware of anything.

An added bonus? This burden of having to archive emails may have an added bonus for it. You can look at it as having an added, real-time email backup system. If your email server crashes chances are good that you will have even your most recent emails saved in an archiver (with the exception of GFI’s archiver since it resides on the mail server). You can restore the lost email using your email archiver.

http://anicholson.edublogs.org/ties-workshop/