Alan’s Blog

Whilst school staff enjoy their long summer holiday, please spare a thought for the ICT officers and the rest of the Desktop Services team who will be hard at work in the schools.
 
The summer holidays offer us the one period in the year when we can carry out major programmes of housekeeping and replacements. This year is no exception. Over the last 6 weeks Alistair Campbell’s Desktop Services team have been putting together this year’s programme.
 
The bulk of this summers work will be taking place in secondary schools. Its our first opportunity to do some serious housekeeping since the PPP Project started all those years ago. During the PPP works access to all areas of the schools was impossible and only limited housekeeping could be carried out.
 
This years programme has already been communicated to the schools and will be followed up again this week (given all the different methods of communication why is it still so difficult to ensure messages reach every teacher in the school?)
 
Here’s a summary of what we will be doing:
 

All Secondary Schools

• Remove all profiles from PCs
• Check all PCs and Macs are automatically updating their anti virus software
• Upgrade Internet Explorer to version 6
• Upgrade the Operating System and memory of all eMacs in Art Departments
• Get lists of the applications in use in each schools Computing, Business Education, Music and CDT departments in preparation for next summers (2007) hardware and software refresh programme
• Carry out a network switch inventory in each school to determine the amount of switches we need to replace if budget is available later in the year.
• Update Shockwave and Flash on all PCs and Macs
• Clear out Internet caches and run security programmes as appropriate
• Complete as many helpdesk jobs as possible

School specific tasks

• Upgrade hard discs and memory of the Dell GX240s at North Berwick High School
• Set the bios on PCs at Knox Academy and Kings Meadow Primary to Wake Up on LAN
• Rename the PCs at Musselburgh Grammar and Ross High School
• Replace 2 colour Laserjet printers and reconfigure PCs at Preston Lodge
• Replace 8 Dell GX1s in the library at Dunbar Grammar

If time allows and we can get access to Primary schools we will also re-image as many PCs as possible with the new Primary PC build. 

This is probably the question I get asked most by schools. The answer is very simple. You have to because East Lothian Council’s Standing Orders say so! Of more interest are the reasons behind this.
By ensuring that everyone across the Council (not just in schools) purchases all of their IT goods and services through the IT Division the Council, (and all our users), get the following benefits:

1. Pricing – budgets are tight so ensuring that people purchase centrally helps us to set-up contracts that maximise our buying power driving costs down.
2.  Standards – by setting and adhering to standards we ensure that hardware and software is as easy to use and support as possible.
3. Lower total cost of ownership – did you know that the purchase price amounts to less than 10% of the cost of owing and running a piece of hardware or software throughout its life? We keep this cost as low as possible by following standards, purchasing quality products (not the always the cheapest!), ensuring proper warranty arrangements are in place etc.
4. Ensure hardware and software you wish to buy will work in your environment. Too many times we have seen people purchase items that will not work with their existing hardware and software.
5. Support – IT will install and look after any hardware and software purchased through us and deal directly with suppliers on your behalf where appropriate. Anything not purchased through IT will only be looked after on a best endeavors basis.
6. Expertise – IT, in conjunction with the Councils procurement team has many years of expertise setting up contracts and purchasing IT goods and services – why should users have to become experts in something they only do once in a while?