Introduction
Welcome to the Tech Report for September. Last month was an extremely busy month with support issues. There were a number of issues that are still ongoing, but also many positive things. As we enter into the second quarter, much of my focus will be on investigating new things for improving technology at HAST as well as the school in general. I discuss some of these projects below.
School Messenger
After Sangha stopped supporting their product, we were left without a parent communication system entering the school year. I quickly reached out to several other companies and we went with School Messenger because of the level of satisfaction schools have with their services.
We began the rollout on Sept. 3 and it went live within a month. Parents and staff will now receive communication through School Messenger.
What does this mean? Emergency notifications, important events such as Virtual Learning Days, Student Led Conferences, etc. can all be communicated with staff and parents by phone, email, and text. Additionally, there are automatic notifications for tardies, absences, and low lunch balances. Additionally we will be using school messenger to send broken iPad notifications.
Overall, this should improve the level of communication between the school and parents. In future months we hope to rollout the School Messenger app to allow teacher, parent, and student communication. null
Building Sign & Marquees
Another project we have been looking into is to install a Building Sign at the top of our building on the East side that is visible from Hohman avenue as cars pass. The sign will have our school name as well as a big hawk. Additionally, we are looking into a Marquees monument sign that is visible from both entrances to the building. This sign will have our school name and a marquees where we can provide information to people as they enter our school parking lot.
Mr. Dupras, Mr. Funchion, and I have met with several vendors and gotten samples as well as quotes over the last month. We are very excited to add these enhancements to our building.
Tech Support Issues
Google Classroom & Relay
Google Classroom continues to have intermittent issues with the pdf editor within the app. Last month I spent time with Google Support and Relay Support (web filter). The issue is the result of something being blocked in our new web filter. Relay Support was unable to figure out what was being blocked and Google support refused to work with Relay.
All websites recommended by both companies were whitelisted in an attempt to stop the issue.
Frustrated by the lack of help I was receiving, I disabled the app on three student iPads so they would only be filtered by the on premise web filter. Google Classroom’s PDF editor worked slowly, but still worked on their devices. I then installed the updated Relay app on their iPads and they continued to have no issues.
This told me two things:
- Google Classroom’s PDF editor is glitchy and works slowly even unfiltered
- Relay seems to make it run slower to the point of not functioning and timing out.
After a couple weeks without any issues after the new updated Relay app, another update came out that seemed to cause the issue all over again.
At the moment, I am trying a few different things such as turning off on premise web filtering on these devices and keeping cloud based filtering on. I am encouraging students to update to iPad OS 13.1.2.
Hopefully next month I can say the issue is resolved. I have asked Relay to reopen my ticket with them. Additionally I have asked teachers to have students take screen shots before trying to send anything and if possible, avoid having students use the pdf editor within Google Classroom.
NWEA Issues
Last month we tested NWEA and found a new issue we had not seen previously. An error message would pop up randomly letting the student know the question was taking too long to load. The student test would need to be suspended in order to continue testing. This made testing very difficult for Middle School last month.
I was on the phone for over 2 hours with NWEA support who could not diagnose or figure out the issue. All the correct sites were white listed and there should not have been any problems. Working on a hunch based upon many of our previous issues, I disabled Relay on high school iPads for the high school NWEA test. This issue did not occur during high school testing.
In the future, I will disable Relay for all testing.
Access Points
On October 3rd, we had an issue with our Access Points and students and staff randomly losing the ability to the connect to the Internet. After restarting all access points, we had no issues.
My guess is some change came from the ISP (Internet Service Provider) that needed to go through our network. I ruled out our web filter and I ruled out our DNS and DHCP servers. That left ISP or our access points themselves (though for them to randomly go out like that makes no sense).
JAMF Pro Update
After an email came from our Mobile Device Management (MDM) Server company (JAMF Pro) informing me of a critical security issue, I updated the JAMF Pro server to the latest version. This was a major update to provide support for iOS 13 and OS Catalina.
iPad OS 13 and Relay
On Friday, October 4th, there was an issue with iPads randomly losing Internet connection after updating to iOS 13. The issue was not related to iOS, but rather Relay. The solution was to stop the download of the Relay update, delete the app, and have it re-download.
Here is part of the message sent from Relay after I pointed out their issue:
It has come to our attention that forced updating of the Relay Smart Agent on devices running iOS 13.1+ or iPad OS 13.1+ will result in a loss of network connectivity. We have reported this issue to Apple but because the fix needs to occur within iOS/iPad OS, we do not have a timeline for resolution.
In the meantime, please update your Smart Agent with this process to ensure ongoing connectivity: With your MDM, remove the Smart Agent. Then with your MDM, redeploy the Smart Agent. We recognize that this may create a small window without filtering on the device but this is the resolution to the issue. If you have a Rocket or Relay Rocket on your network, they will provide back-up filtering during this brief period. Please note this only applies to devices running iOS/iPad OS 13.1 or greater. If you have not yet updated to this version, you can disregard this maintenance advisory.
Staff Mac OS updates
With the release of Mac OS Catalina, I have advised teachers to ensure they are updated to the latest version of Mac OS Mojave. Unfortunately, many teacher devices are extremely out of date with updates. My advise is to stay one OS version behind the current one. This is especially true for the first few months so we can test the new OS and make sure all the bugs are gone.
Over the next couple weeks, we will be manually updating staff who are extremely out of date with their Mac OS version and providing instructions to others on how to get the latest security updates.
Relay Report
Despite all of the issues we have had with Relay, it still does an incredible job of blocking inappropriate content from student devices. I spent some time recently looking for alternatives to Relay because of all the issues we have encountered. I even spoke with a few different school IT professionals and Network Engineers and they all agree Relay is still the best option despite the issues. After my research, I agree. The other options do not filter as well and are not effective.
Support Ticket Breakdown
Support tickets were much lower this last month as is to be expected. First month is always the busiest. Last month most of the issues were related to PowerSchool account resets. There is nothing else that really sticks out in the breakdown. Big issues took up a majority of our time last month.
Broken iPads
There were only two broken iPads again last month. Much improved over a year ago.
Lost iPads
Lost iPads skyrocketed last month with 13. This is absolutely ridiculous. While all iPads were recovered, this number is extremely too high and needs to come down. Students need to be more responsible with their devices.
Reminders
- Please remember to fill out support tickets for support issues.
- Take care of your devices.
- Visit HAST Tech Store for chargers, screen protectors, and to pay iPad deductible online
