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Tech Office updates for 12-14-2022

Hello everyone!  A few updates ... Phishing test email this morning Kudos to all of you who reported or otherwise didn't fall for today's phishing email test.  We do these tests to promote awareness among our staff as well as to meet our cyber-insurance requirements.   This was our third test this semester, and we're happy to see that our click-through for this test was very low (only one person as of this email).   The email is marked [External email] in the header, and also has the yellow "External" label in Gmail.  That's enough right there to tell you it's something from outside the district. The address is from "School Principal" -- no name and not a real From: address.  Even if the [External email] labels didn't ring alarm bells, this should. Vaguely-worded email imploring you to urgently do something you wouldn't normally do, and do it right now. We will run another test series later in the spring, so be watching our newsletters fo

Update for Tech Managers 12-07-2022

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  Hello everyone!  Some quick technical-oriented updates on what we're doing this month. Wireless update ... Fremont1_BYOD The Fremont1_BYOD network is solely for non-district devices; it should not be used by any district-owned device.    If a district Chrome device does connect to it, the device will switch itself back to Secure within a minute or so.   We are hearing that some devices that should be able to connect are being disallowed, and we  are also seeing in the dashboard that devices that should NOT be allowed on BYOD are still getting on (especially Android devices).  We are reaching out to Meraki to see if there' s a way to fine- tu ne the identification settings that determine what kind of device is connecting.  If there is a student or staff member with an educational personal device who is having trouble, let us know the details and we can add it to our investigation. Wireless update ... Fremont1_District new secure network We are planning to make this network the

Wireless network changes coming in November 2022

We are making changes to our two existing wireless networks, Fremont1_Secure and Fremont1_Guest.  These networks have been in operation since 2009, and these changes will refocus our networking resources on our primary purpose of education, as well as meet some of the trends we've been seeing the last few years, including: At some sites, the number of personal devices connecting on the network is now 2-3x more than the number of district devices connecting daily. Our upcoming Linewize content filtering solution (see the next page) will allow us to provide a better experience for those choosing to use their own devices, and this change will prepare for that. A focus on how security overall is changing and what we can do to better align with those changes. These changes will start rolling out the week of November 7th.     "Fremont1_District" will replace the existing Fremont1_Secure network This network is intended for district-owned devices only. The secure access key wil

Fremont #1 Tech Success newsletter for October-November 2022

We've been quiet with news and happenings for the last month, so this newsletter will be an combined October-November newsletter.   Contents include Wireless network change: We are making changes to our long-time wireless networks. These changes will start this month, and details are in the newsletter. Highlighting two of our new teacher tech checkout kits Some tech initiatives we're doing this fall with teachers, as well as things on the back end. The newsletter is tweeted and  available on our Tech Services website .   You can also view it by clicking here.

Phishing email tests coming again this fall

  Hello! We are receiving more and more phishing emails -- emails that pretend to be from a District staff member but are not sent from a @landerschools.org address.  By now, I believe all of us have received several such emails, with the names of principals or Central Office staff inserted to trick us.   At first glance, you might think that it's a real email, but there are several obvious clues you can look for to determine if it's real or not. We have posted some resources on the Tech Services website to help you spot these kinds of emails.  Would everyone please take a few minutes to read through this and ensure you're familiar with how to spot these fraudulent emails?   Starting in November 2022, we will be running several phishing email tests.  These are safe emails from our security provider (Sophos) that we can customize and target to different staff groups.  If you click on a link in a test email, you will be taken to a Sophos support page that will reinforce phis

Merlyn Mind staff visited Fremont #1.

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This fall, some of our teachers are piloting a new hardware component named MerlynMind.  Merlyn is a voice-activated interface that can control a teacher PC or Chromebook.  Teachers can give verbal commands to find documents in their Google Drive, open websites, move through slide decks, control YouTube playback as well as other edtech applications, and much more.  Since it's education friendly, it doesn't have the privacy concerns of an Amazon Echo or similar device. Two weeks ago, Reema and Richard -- a sales rep and an engineer from MerlynMind -- traveled all the way to Lander to spend a day seeing how we're using Merlyn and to offer us suggestions.  They also gave our pilot teachers an introductory PD showcasing some of its commands.  Thanks Reema and Richard for taking the time to come to Lander and work with us!

We're Back for the 2022-2023 school year!

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Hello!  It's been more than two years since we've used our Tech blog page.  So ..... we've purged all the old content and we're starting anew for the 2022-2023 school year! Going forward, we will be using this as a resource to communicate with both staff and the community.  For our staff, the blog will also replace our monthly newsletter that we've done in years past.  This will let us get articles and information out to staff in a more timely manner than waiting for a month's worth of newsletter to be typed and formatted.   We will send blog posts via email to staff as Tech updates as we post them, and we will use tags to identify posts as being for everyone, as opposed to things that might be posted just for tech managers or other groups of stsaff. Keep an eye out for postings in the next few weeks regarding: Some new and exciting professional development opportunities for District staff, from our 2019-2020 Innovations in Technology grant. Fall and spring tech