Laptops for Teachers

We have got to get our teachers laptops and teach them the basic skills of how to use them both on and off campus. Hurriedly handing them a student laptop from a mobile lab is not the solution.

Yesterday I was at an educational technology training session with a group of our SLCSD teachers. This training session continues today and into four more days throughout this winter and spring. Since teachers don't have laptops, they needed to borrow student configured laptops. Therefore, there are proxies set up in the Internet settings for filtered Internet access. There are in house DNS settings that work only at school. There are profile settings that preclude the ability of a teacher to log in for the very first time off campus. Oh, and how about the laptops with Deep Freeze which keeps computers clean for student use at school but reeks havoc on a teacher trying to use a laptop at an adult teacher level away from school? The only thing that saved this group of teachers was that the high school tech and I were with them for training and could troubleshoot what was going on. Is it a problem with the configuration of the laptops? Absolutely not. There is a standard for shared student laptops that have network access and file storage space at school that works very well for student use in house.On the other hand, laptops configured for teachers would be completely different.

For teachers to attend training, for teachers to attend meetings, for teachers to work in groups in various locations both at school and away from school, for teachers to conveniently work from home, teachers need laptops! It is a professional necessity.