From the Desk of the Tech Director
A Safe Place to Fall
October is National Cybersecurity Awareness Month!
You might be sitting here reading this and saying “Why should I care about cybersecurity? We have a tech department that handles that sort of thing.”
True enough: cybersecurity is something that my department and I are always thinking about. There are a number of proactive measures we have taken in order to mitigate the risk of a cyberincident from occurring. However: the sobering reality is that unless everyone takes an active role/concern over cybersecurity, we will still continue to have higher than normal chances for a cyberincident to occur that could potentially cost millions of dollars to repair and endless headaches for everyone (not just the tech department).
CISCO, one of the most active tech companies in existence today, takes cybersecurity very seriously and tracks global trends. As of the end of last year, CISCO’s data suggested that around 90% of all data breaches happen because of phishing.
What is phishing? Definition: the fraudulent practice of sending emails purporting to be from reputable companies in order to induce individuals to reveal personal information, such as passwords and credit card numbers.
Here are some cybersafety items everyone should enact, no matter if it’s personally or professionally.
4 Things You Can Do (from CISA and NCA)
Throughout October, CISA (the Cybersecurity & Infrastructure Security Agency) and NCA (NAtional Cybersecurity Alliance) will highlight key action steps that everyone should take:
Think Before You Click: Recognize and Report Phishing: If a link looks a little off, think before you click. It could be an attempt to get sensitive information or install malware.
Update Your Software: Don't delay -- If you see a software update notification, act promptly. Better yet, turn on automatic updates.
Use Strong Passwords: Use passwords that are long, unique, and randomly generated. Use password managers to generate and remember different, complex passwords for each of your accounts. A passwords manager will encrypt passwords securing them for you!
Enable Multi-Factor Authentication: You need more than a password to protect your online accounts, and enabling MFA makes you significantly less likely to get hacked.
Keep an eye out for our ongoing fake-phishing emails that can help train your knowledge of what to do/not to do in the event of receiving a real phishing email!!!
Bonus! Some helpful Dell laptop tips…
For staff members who have been issued one of the Dell Latitude laptops, here are some helpful hints to help improve performance:
You are responsible for doing ALL Windows Updates on your device!
If you run into problems/errors when doing updates
When using your laptop, it always needs to be on a clean, hard, flat surface with clear space around it for proper airflow. This is even more important if your laptop is docked and the lid is closed.
Also: please do not stack things on top of your laptop. That is bad for numerous reasons.
This is a Google Chrome browser tip for any computer…including our Dell laptops:
When you are in Chrome, try to keep your open browser tabs to a minimum. The more tabs you have open, the more resources Chrome will hog from your laptop, causing it to run harder and hotter and deplete your battery life faster!
If you like to take your laptop home with you, here are steps you need to take with your Dell:
Go to the Start Menu (the Windows icon, which is in the lower left in Windows 10 and in the lower center if you upgraded to Windows 11), left click, and then find the Power icon.
Right click the Power icon and choose “Shutdown”.
Do not close your screen right away…and definitely do not put your laptop in your bag right away. Instead: wait until it is completely shut down before closing the lid and putting it in your bag.
If you were docked when initiating “shutdown”, keep it docked and do not move it until shutdown has completed.
A Safe Place to Fall
Anyone who walks into my office at Korger-Chestnut can tell that I am a Star Wars fan. Anyone who spends a decent amount of time with me will likely learn that I am a huge TV/movie buff in general. But…those people who know me really well get to see and hear what it is like for pop culture to have complete possession of half a human brain and constantly leaking out through trivia and quotes.
During the “Welcome Back” event at the high school this year, Mr. Holmes played Denzel Washington’s famous commencement speech to the University of Pennsylvania graduating class of 2011. In that speech, the actor urges graduates to “fall forward”: take risks and fail, but never stop moving forward. It’s a fantastic message, and one that I recognize having been echoed through a number of television shows and movies over the years. Whenever I hear that speech, there is one movie quote that always comes to mind:
“And why do we fall, Bruce? So we can learn to pick ourselves up.” – Thomas Wayne in Batman Begins
Thomas Wayne says this iconic line to a young Bruce Wayne after Bruce falls down an old well and into what will eventually become The Batcave. Denzel’s speech and this movie quote are both examples that perfectly illustrate what it means to have a growth mindset. Yet: in order to be able to learn and demonstrate the resiliency to fall forward, a person needs to feel completely safe enough to take risks and potentially fall in the process. Only then can a person learn how to pick oneself back up.
As educators, this is all we should ever want to create for our students: a safe place to fall so they can learn to pick themselves up and try again. However, in order for educators to be able to create that kind of atmosphere for their students, they need to be able to feel it and to experience it for themselves.
I would like to challenge all of you this year to push outside of your comfort zones in order to incorporate technology into your classrooms and into your lessons in ways you may have never tried before. The Tech Department has your back! Let us know how and when we can support you. Cara and Luke will be getting into buildings on a regular basis as one way to help create a safe space for you all to be able to innovate with technology. If you try something new and it doesn’t go well…it’s okay! Just keep moving forward!!! We are looking forward to another fantastic year!
Save Early, Save Often
If you are around my age (42) or younger and grew up around video games (or someone who considered him/her/themselves a “gamer”, there is a good chance you have heard this motto…especially if there was a game that was particularly difficult to beat. I believe the phrase originally had its foundations in saving/investing money, however. Continuing the topic that I wrote about in November, I’d like to marry these two concepts together in the form of discussing “protecting digital content”.
I recently attended the SLATE Conference in Wisconsin Dells, where I was fortunate to attend a breakout session given by Dr. Robert Smiley, the Chief Information Officer for the Janesville School District. If you hadn’t heard in the news, the Janesville School District was hit by a ransomware attack back on October 24th, and they are still dealing with the fallout from it.
Here are some security lessons in which you can invest some time in order to protect yourself and your content:
The attack took out anything and everything they had stored on individual computers and servers. Years worth of saved files, assignments, assessments…gone.
Everything the district and its employees saved out in “the cloud”? Absolutely fine. If you want to safeguard your documents, it may be wise to save them in the cloud: Google Drive, Microsoft OneDrive, and other cloud-based storage resources are the easiest way to safeguard your digital content.
If you want to protect your digital files in another way? Buy an external hard drive and regularly back-up all your files to that hard drive as well. You can never be too careful!
How did the ransomware enter their network? As best as they can tell, an employee had attended a conference and while at that conference connected to the facility’s public WiFi. While using the public WiFi at the conference, the ransomware made its ways into the employee’s email on that laptop and deposited itself into the Janesville School District network when the employee returned to work and reconnected.
When I travel and bring my personal laptop with me, I will often use a VPN (Virtual Private Network) client if I absolutely have no choice but to connect to a public WiFi network.
Another alternative I use to protect myself is to turn on the mobile hotspot feature on my cell phone and then connect my laptop to the internet using my phone as a hotspot. Then I know I do not have to connect to a public WiFi network that may be less secure and susceptible to malware.
My hope is that we never have to deal with a ransomware attack…but the more we can do to be proactive around security, the better we can protect ourselves and make it harder for hackers!
From all of us in the Department of Educational Technology: Happy Holidays to all of you and your families!! Get in some much needed and well-deserved rest and relaxation over the break!
Identity Theft is Not a Joke, Jim!
Yes, Dwight is correct. With the exception of the above linked clip from The Office, identity theft is most definitely not a joke.
With November here, many of you may turn toward online shopping as you purchase gifts for the holidays. The online world can be a very precarious place when it comes to downloading apps, opening accounts, making purchases, checking emails, and a whole lot more. Recently I was in a meeting with other tech directors from schools, colleges, and city/county departments in the Chippewa Valley area, and one of the main topics discussed was how identity theft / ransomware is on the rise.
With that said, I want to bring back some handy hints along with some new ones to help everyone - personally and as a district - stay safe online.
Do NOT use the same password for everything. In fact, don’t use the same password for anything! We also put students at risk for compromised passwords when we ask them to use their CFAUSD password for another website. As a rule, teachers should not be asking students to create accounts on other websites.
Also: make sure to change your passwords at least once a year. Some of our prominent district programs -- Active Directory (Windows login) and Skyward -- automatically make us all change our password after 365 days of use. For others, we have to run a script to force password changes (which will be in January). This is also the reason we started including a student password change this year and every year moving forward.
Do not share your password with anyone. That includes logging in for someone, which is not only bad practice, but also a violation of the district’s acceptable use policy.
Use a complex password. A good example of this is to think of a sentence and use the first letter from each word of the sentence. Such as: The only cereal Mom found at the store was GrapeNuts for $6.78. The password would be TocMf@tswGNf$687 (or you can leave out the dollar sign). I don’t think anyone would guess that password. PS - I don’t use that password for anything.
If you are worried about remembering completely different complex passwords for all of your different accounts (personal and professional), find yourself a reputable Password Manager program. Or: write them all down and keep them somewhere safe...like in a safe.
Use “Sign In With…” when you can for 3rd party sites. Sites that use this method cannot see your Google password or your Facebook password; they instead choose to trust Google and/or Facebook as a credible authentication of your account. In this scenario, you still have to be able to trust that your Google and/or Facebook passwords are secure.
Use Two-Factor Authentication. This is the technology that will send you a text message to verify that you are who you say you are when you are signing into an account. This is not hack-proof, but it will slow hackers down.
On the flip side of 2FA texting, SIM spoofing has also been on the rise within the last year or two: Data Breaches are often the cause, like the recent T-Mobile one. Thieves will spoof someone’s stolen SIM card info in order to duplicate and take over your cell phone account. There are also 2FA apps out there you can use -- like Microsoft Authenticator and Google Authenticator -- instead of text-based 2FA that add another layer of protection and slow hackers down.
Here is one last tip, and this is for checking emails. When checking emails: if it seems suspicious, then treat it suspiciously. A good way to learn more about suspicious emails is to check exactly who it is from. What I mean by that is: if it seems suspicious, out of character, or phishy (see what I did there?), don’t trust it just because it has a familiar name on it.
“Please place the mask over your own mouth and nose before assisting others.”
No, this isn’t a cheeky way of getting into a discussion about masks. I am actually going to take this in another direction you may not expect a director of educational technology to go in: a conversation about self-care.
If you have ever flown on a commercial airplane before, chances are you have heard a version of that opening statement. The flight attendants say this line to passengers in regard to the oxygen masks that descend from the ceiling in the event the cabin becomes depressurized. The point of that statement is: you have to help yourself first if you expect to be able to help anyone else.
Self-care is vital for everyone to partake in, especially after the last 18 months and as we continue to navigate our way forward together. Coincidentally, October is Emotional Wellness Month and National Depression Education Awareness Month...so I thought it would be a good opportunity to share some ways that technology can assist us with self-care and emotional wellbeing.
*Note: First of all, let me advocate for keeping your screen time in check and at healthy levels. Make sure to disconnect frequently: take a walk or exercise, read a book, spend time with family & friends! Also: be careful not to get sucked in by the swirling vortex of social media when you are in front of a screen. Last: the items shared below are not meant to take the place of actual professional help. Please make sure to seek assistance from a professional if you are having difficulty coping with stress, anxiety, emotions, and/or mental health!
There are a variety of helpful apps out there that focus on wellness, mindfulness, health, etc. There are several apps featured on the HR Google Site. One is called Headspace, a meditation and mindfulness app that is free to school employees in the United States. Another is What's Up, a free app that provides you tools to help cope with anxiety, depression, stress, and more.
In conjunction with apps and smartphones, some smart watchmakers have been able to incorporate numerous types of sensors and new technology into their designs. The two arguably dominant companies -- Apple and Samsung -- tout several health-related features, including (but not limited to) heart rate monitoring, blood oxygen levels, sleep tracking, and stress levels.
The last category I will share here is one that even I was reluctant to get into until just last year: podcasts. Although I can’t precisely tell you why I was reluctant, I will tell you that having a nearly hour-long commute to/from work definitely helped me break down my own barrier. Now that I have broken down that barrier, I find I don’t even need a long commute anymore to enjoy listening to podcasts. Listening around the house has become equally enjoyable!
There are a few different ways to access podcasts out there. My method of choice is through using Spotify. Even with a free account, you can enjoy hundreds (likely thousands) of podcasts out there that range from a wide variety of topics: true crime stories, history, celebrities, science, comedy, current events...just to name some.
Below are some of my favorites that helped me get through the last year. I hope you can enjoy them too...or at least let them springboard you into finding your own. Take care of yourselves!
From the Desk of the Tech Director 9/7/2021
Education and technology have been a part of who I am and what I do for as long as I can remember. Growing up, I had a mother who taught at my hometown elementary school. In her classroom was one of those old Apple "green screen" computers with a floppy drive. I remember being so intrigued at the educational games you could play and the computer programming a person could do that I signed up for a Logo programming class during summertime "College for Kids" classes offered at UW-Platteville. As I progressed through my elementary years, I often stayed after school to teach some of my mother's students how to use the computer. Technology advanced, and soon came the Apple II GS computers with color graphics and sound and educational games like "The Oregon Trail'' and "Where In the World Is Carmen SanDiego?". Technology, of course, kept on growing by leaps and bounds.
Why do I dwell on these memories now? That's simple: technology afforded me a way to break through limits, which was something that reading books also had done at that same time in my life...albeit in a different manner. My hometown Monticello, Wisconsin, was not large by any standard - a population of around 1100. Both reading and technology allowed me to explore ideas, concepts, and possibilities beyond the immediate world in which I was living. As I reflect upon my roles in public education over the
last 19 years -- as a reading teacher, an ad hoc technology coach, and a building administrator -- I find over and over again a common theme: technology has always been a great resource and tool for me in my educational career. Technology never replaced my education, but it did ingrain itself more and more as it was used in balance with other learning strategies and resources. It also continued to help me push past limits and open up so many more opportunities beyond those previously available.
I am grateful for this new opportunity to serve as the Director of Educational Technology for the CFAUSD. All I have ever wanted to do is to work with colleagues who also believe in the power of public education. I look forward to being part of a team that helps educators focus on the fundamentals (“best practice”) of education while breaking down any walls of hesitation that may be preventing them from technologically enhancing their teaching skills in order to engage students on a new and exciting level.
My wife Janet and I are also very excited for the opportunity that Chippewa Falls presents for our family. Our daughter Annabelle has started 6th Grade at CFMS, and our son Nathaniel is in 4th Grade at Hillcrest. After a year of virtual learning, both were extremely eager to get back to in-person learning this year and have already given enthusiastic feedback regarding their experiences after the first week. All four of us are thrilled to be a part of the CFAUSD and the Chippewa Falls community!
From the Desk of the Tech Director
Information Hackers Don't Want You to Know
Recently, our district has started a phishing campaign to provide professional development to help prevent malicious attacks on our network. Phishing is not the only way that hackers can get access to your data. Another easy way to get your information is through data breaches. A data breach is when information is stolen or shared with unauthorized people.
Let me run down for you a real-life example of how this can happen. In 2018, MyFitnessPal incurred a breach that affected 150 million users. The login credentials and passwords were shared with an unauthorized person or group, which means that a potentially malicious person had access to your MyFitnessPal account. You might have shrugged a bit, thinking, who cares if people can see what I ate for breakfast this week or my current weight? However, MyFitnessPal is linked with MapMyFitness, where you can track your fitness workouts. Let’s say that a malicious actor has access to maps of your daily walk. It won’t be hard to figure out where you live from that information.
That slight feeling of fear that just washed over you is your body’s way of alerting you that this could be bad.
Subsequently, I hear people say quite frequently, “I use the same password for everything.” Even if you use the same password for some things, now the hacker has access to your other accounts. And, trust me, he or she is trying that password from MyFitnessPal in all of your email and social media accounts. If one of those has the same password, that hacker just gained access to a whole bunch of other personal information about you.
So, now a hacker knows where you live and has hacked into your Facebook account. He or she is watching for things you do, people you know and places you visit. Because you’re a community-minded person, you also “liked” the Facebook page for your local bank because of its contributions to your local community and school. Just for kicks, the hacker tries your universal password in that banking system… or Amazon… or PayPal.
While in your Facebook account, the hacker can also start to create a socially engineered attack on you by noticing that you frequently visit coffee shops, post memes about caffeine, and “like” the Caffeine Lovers Facebook page. With access to your email account, this hacker poses as you and sends your friends an email stating that you have sent them a free gift subscription to a Coffee of the Month Club. All your friends need to do is pay for the shipping costs. Your friends, knowing you love coffee as much as they do, enter a PayPal payment for shipping for coffee they will never receive.
You are starting to see why any breach of information is potentially harmful. While this scenario was made up (beyond the MyFitnessPal breach, that was real), it is a plausible scenario and hackers are getting ever more crafty in obtaining information.
The good news is, there are some ways that you can help protect your data.
Do NOT use the same password for everything. Just don’t. We also put students at risk for a compromised password when we ask them to use their CFAUSD password for another website. As a rule, teachers should not be asking students to create accounts on other websites.
Do not share your password with anyone. That includes logging in for someone, which is not only bad practice but also a violation of the district’s acceptable use policy.
Use a complex password. A good example of this is thinking of a sentence and use the first letter from each word of the sentence. Such as The floor at Korger-Chestnut has squeaked since 1923. The password would be Tf@KChss1923. I don’t think anyone would guess that password… (PS, I don’t use that password for anything.)
Use “Sign In With…” when you can for 3rd party sites. MyFitnessPal cannot see your Facebook password if you use to sign in with Facebook. MyFitnessPal uses Facebook as a credible authentication of your account. In this scenario, you still have to be able to trust that your Facebook password is secure.
Use Two-Factor Authentication. This is the technology that will send you a text message to verify that you are who you say you are when you are signing into an account. This is not hack-proof, but it will slow hackers down.
If you’re wondering if your CFAUSD login information has been compromised, there is a really good chance that it has been at some point. This report regarding our domain shows that 1687 total identities have been compromised through over 300 breaches of information. Our annual password change assists with our staff information security, however, this also includes students. We have not initiated student password changes, but that is on the horizon. We have much work to do in this area, but we are continuously making steps toward better security.
Elementary Teachers New Classroom Tech
Elementary teachers, you get to look forward to all the above (minus wireless keyboard & mouse), plus, the ability to use your Smartboard as an oversized computer. Yes, that is right! Teachers can sign into their Smartboard just like they do with their desktop computer and use it in that sense with a wired keyboard and mouse. Also, as your device is docked, you will have the same capabilities you have been accustomed to with your desktop computer and Smartboard.
Jennifer Kuehl Sarah Merconti are teachers at Stillson and they wanted to share how their new technology has gone thus far. Jennifer says "Screen beam (once we got it working in all classrooms) was a lifesaver for teaching in the classrooms on a cart. Now being back in the music room I am enjoying using notebook lessons again and being able to use the smartboard as a smartboard." She also mentioned how she loves all the options she has to share on her screen and it just took a little time to figure out what is best that suits her particular lesson. Sarah says, "I love the fact that the Smartboard is its own computer. This works GREAT for subs, too. I also love the flexibility of having the option to be mobile with the Screen Beam."
From The Desk of the Tech Director
I have been asked as a technology leader, How do you balance innovation with consistency? My answer is building systems with a lot of flexibility. The rebuilding of Stillson Elementary School allowed me to observe, seek feedback, and dream about what classroom technology could look like in 2020 and beyond.
We began by piloting mobile classroom setups upon request by teachers. We outfitted teachers with a Macbook, an iPad and an Apple TV connected to the projector so that the teacher could teach from anywhere in the room using a mobile device wirelessly and utilize the iPad as a writing surface to demonstrate, mark up and annotate instructional materials without getting in the way of students’ views of the board.
For instructional purposes, this worked very well. Technologically, we had some issues. We had numerous issues with Apple TV’s displaying properly, with iPad apps not being compatible with Apple TV, with devices losing their wireless internet connection when streaming, with sound and video not working consistently, etc. If you have been an early adopter of the mobile classroom setup, you may have experienced some, or all of these! We made changes to settings and did troubleshooting with Apple on issues we were having, but we were not able to solve the issues with finality.
At the same time, it started to become more apparent that declining enrollment was going to cause all of us to tighten our purse strings on the financial front. That, along with the human capital it requires to maintain and services thousands of devices had me dreaming about a 1-device solution for mobile classroom. Other requests, such as dual monitors and the requirement to have mobile devices for meetings prevented us from keeping just desktops in classrooms.
We researched and developed a Windows Mobile Classroom solution as the solution for all teachers at the CFAUSD. So far, Stillson has implemented this approach, CFMS will be fully implemented by the end of the school year, and Hillcrest and Halmstad will experience these upgrades over the summer of 2021. Plans to continue this roll-out district-wide are underway as well, realizing that we cannot (and should not) replace all devices at one time in the district.
Why is this solution both innovative and consistent? Well, it is consistent because every teacher gets the same pieces: a Windows touchscreen laptop, a docking station with a wide monitor, keyboard, mouse and stylus pen. All rooms will also be outfitted with a ScreenBeam wireless screening device (kind of like a Windows version of Apple TV). This system integrates with a Smartboard at the elementary schools and a projector at the MS and HS. All classrooms will be set up the same in that regard.
Why is this solution innovative? Well, this is the interesting part. Teachers have the flexibility to use this set of tools in a variety of ways. When the laptop is “docked” at your desk, it gets a wired internet connection and is directly connected with your Smartboard or projector. It acts as a desktop computer and has all of the reliability of a desktop computer.
If you don’t like to be tethered to your desk, you can undock your laptop and wirelessly display from anywhere in your room. You can write on the screen of the touchscreen laptop and students will see on the display your notes and annotations. Students can demonstrate work on the touchscreen laptop as well.
The SMARTboards in elementary classrooms can also act completely independently from any computer, which means students can be working on a completely separate and independent activity on the Smartboard while a teacher is working with a group of students utilizing the laptop.
There are many more ways that this setup can be used for flexible innovation in the classroom to leverage high impact instructional strategies to promote engagement and learning. These are just a few. At this time, the schedule for completing the rest of the replacements would include updating the high school work stations in the summer of 2022 as well as Parkview work stations and Smartboards. Southview would be completed in the summer of 2023. (Southview had the most recent updates in technology before Stillson, completed in 2015).