IT Communications

February 15, 2024 - 1:39 PM !

To: District Staff

Subject: Internet Outage Planned for 4:05PM Today

All,

I apologize for having to take down the internet so frequently lately. I’m very hopeful that today will be the last time for a good long while and we’ll be able to schedule future maintenance well outside the workday hours.

Today’s outage could be for as long as 10 minutes. If you are in district, this outage will not affect your access to PowerSchool.

Rich Fielding

February 14, 2024 - 4:12 PM !

To: District Staff

Subject: Brief Internet Outage at 4:30

All,

I’m planning a brief outage of our internet at approximately 4:30PM today. We should only be offline for a couple of minutes.

Rich Fielding

February 9, 2024 - 12:00 PM

To: Middle School Teachers

Subject: New category of sites being blocked

All,

 

I’ve just added the category “Audio & Video” to the block list for Middle School students. We’re seeing an uptick in students using youtube to mp3  and mp4 conversion websites and we’ll just be chasing our tails if we try to block them individually. After only a few minutes we’re seeing a bunch of sites getting blocked that students were going to inappropriately due to this change.

 

If there are sites you count on that are now getting blocked because of this change, please submit them through the ticket system.

 

Best,

 

Rich Fielding

February 6, 2024 - 4:52 PM

To: East Hampton Public Schools - Staff, Parents, and Students(6-12) via ParentSquare

Subject: Chromebooks having issues with Frontier Fiber

 

Dear East Hampton Public Schools Community,

There is a known issue with our Chromebooks being blocked by Frontier Fiber internet's eero router/modems. If you have upgraded to Frontier Fiber and have been having issues with your child's district provided Chromebook accessing the internet, please follow these instructions to fix the issue.

All the best,

Rich Fielding
Director of Technology
East Hampton Public Schools

February 2, 2024 - 11:13 AM

To: District Staff

Subject: Planned Network Maintenance


All,

 

We are planning a couple network and server outages for late this afternoon.

 

At approximately 4:05 PM we will lose internet for about one minute.

 

Between 4:30 and 6 PM, PowerSchool will go offline for approximately 45 minutes. The Student Data dashboard for about 20 minutes, and the Data server for about 20 minutes(this mostly affects the offices). The exact timing is up in the air. We’ll try to do PowerSchool last to support the Elementary offices who may need student/parent contact information.

 

Have a great weekend!

 

Rich Fielding

January 31, 2024 - 3:04 PM

To: District Staff

Subject: Unblocking YouTube Videos


All,

 

Per my last email, you can request specific YouTube videos(not channels) be unblocked so you can then share them with your students to watch on their own. The BEST method to do this is to copy the FULL URL from your browser’s address bar and then paste that into the trouble ticket.

 

YouTube’s links are very complex. If you right click the video, it will say “Copy video URL” but IT’s A LIE! That option copies a shortened version of the link. When that gets clicked on it goes to two other places before the video shows. So that would mean we have to submit three separate links to unblock the one video. But if you copy the URL from the address bar and send that to IT and to your students, it will work.

 

Rich Fielding

January 31, 2024 - 2:22 PM !

To: District Staff

Subject: Please Use the Ticket System. Yes, you. ;-)

Hello Everyone,

I am getting an increasing number of emails for basic support issues that should be getting filed as trouble tickets. When you submit a ticket, it can be addresses by Chris, Bryden, or Sebby without me needing to slow down the operation. Especially if I’m out of the office or focused on a project for the day. This goes for just about all issues, INCLUDING: staff and student account issues, badge reprints, website/YouTube video unblock requests, and on and on and on.

 

Also, it is imperative that when you fill out the trouble ticket you use your easthamptonct.org email address and put it in correctly. You will then receive emails from support@easthamptonct.org with updates on the ticket. With most tickets we will send you a message with follow up questions or updates to the ticket status. Very often we will send a follow up question asking you to see if it’s working now. All you need to do is reply to the email and we’ll be notified.

 

Last, a link to the ticket system is in the signature of almost every email I send out, so if you are in need of the link, just look below!

 

Thank you all so much!

 

Rich Fielding

January 25, 2024 - 4:01 PM

To: District Staff

Subject: RE: GoGuardian Teacher Replaces Impero Edpro(Original Sent 1/24/2024)


An important update for anyone with a Co-Teacher or classroom support role. For you to access the class you are the Co-Teacher/Support Staff of, the primary teacher of that section has to activate it in GoGuardian first.

 

For example, if you are a teacher at Center School, your partner teacher has to activate their class first. Once they do, you will automatically have that section added to your Active Classes.

January 25, 2024 - 8:14 AM

To: District Staff

Subject: RE: Internet Issue(Original Sent 1/24/2024)

This issue popped up again this morning, mostly on staff laptops, but should be resolved now.

January 24, 2024 - 1:45 PM

To: District Staff

Subject: Internet Issue

We are aware of an issue with some websites getting blocked and are working to resolve asap.

 

Rich Fielding

January 24, 2024 - 8:53 AM !

To: District Staff

Subject: GoGuardian Teacher Replaces Impero Edpro

Teachers, Interventionists, and Paraprofessionals who monitor students’ use of technology, this is for YOU!

 

Over the last couple of weeks, the Middle School has been using a new tool for monitoring student Chromebooks and desktops called GoGuardian Teacher. GoGuardian Teacher has several additional features that we have been sorely missing with Impero Edpro and we are thrilled to announce we have brokered a deal with GoGuardian to receive the product FREE for the remainder of the school year and at the same price as Edpro into the future. In other words, there is no budget impact!

 

Pros:

-Easy login through Clever(it’s already there, see for yourself!)

-Ability to create new classes within GoGuardian. Your classes from PowerSchool sync automatically, but you can create custom classes as well.

-Create, save, and apply multiple “Scenes” to allow or block websites

-A history of student activity during a class session, so you can see the tabs the student visited after the fact

-Better user interface. Hands down, not even close. Includes much better detail of sites being viewed and is more intuitive

-Easily set timed sessions for a class. At elementary you can set it for the whole day, while at Middle and High School you can set it to the period length. You can even create a schedule so sessions start automatically!

-There is more, but isn’t all this enough!?

 

Cons:

-For those monitoring Windows Computers, it’s not quite as smooth as Impero. I’ll be reaching out to you to go over the differences.

-From IT’s perspective, we don’t have as much insight as to what policies teachers are implementing in their classes. If a student is getting blocked by GoGuardian, the teacher has to determine where the block is coming from. It’s built into the teacher interface to see this information, so this could be considered a “Pro” from the teacher perspective since you can resolve the issue immediately and not have to wait for IT to research and reply.

 

How to get started:

 

So here’s the quick version of how to get up and running, and a link to a VERY useful pdf with more details and instructions.

 

 

TIP #1: If students are showing as inactive in your class, either have them restart their Chromebook OR have them type chrome://restart in their address bar and hit enter. This is a much faster way of closing all the open tabs and restarting all the Chrome extensions.

TIP #2: Use https://support.goguardian.com/s/goguardian-teacher for helpful articles and videos on how to use the tools.

 

Finally, to reduce the strain on Chromebooks, we will be removing the Impero extension from devices over the next few weeks which means you won’t be able to monitor them via Edpro. So please make shifting away from Edpro to GoGuardian a priority.

 

Rich Fielding

January 23, 2024 - 3:40 PM

To: Middle School Teachers

Subject: GoGuardian Replacing Edpro and FAQ

All,

 

A few items have come up regarding GoGuardian that we have found some solutions for.

 

Similar to Edpro, teachers need to make sure they end their session with students so if they’ve applied a “scene” it is removed before the student is in their next class. Teachers can use the Scene Status to determine if their students are still being managed by another teacher’s scene. Using Scene Statuses

 

If a student is showing up as disconnected, either have then restart the Chromebook, or type chrome://restart into their address bar and hit enter. This is a quick way to close and reload all their extensions without logging out or restarting.

 

If you are using a “Scene” to only allow specific websites, it’s been reported that to keep SmartPass working, you need to add both https://app.smartpass.app AND https://app.smartpass.app/main/passes

 

Last, and VERY IMPORTANT, I am planning to remove the Impero Edpro extensions from the Middle School Chromebooks very soon. If you are still using Edpro, switch to GoGuardian ASAP. Removing the Impero extension should allow the Chromebooks to operate faster and help their batteries last a little longer.

 

Best,

 

Rich Fielding

January 10, 2024 - 1:49 PM !

To: Middle School Teachers

Subject: Impero Edpro Replacement for Middle School Teachers

All,

 

We now have a new tool, GoGuardian Teacher, for monitoring students’ screens and similar features that Edpro has. I am sending this initial email to our Middle School teachers first due to the large number of issues we’ve been having with Impero at the Middle School, especially this week during iReady testing.

 

As much as I’d like to give you all the training you should have on this, I think it’s more important that you get into the system, sync your classes, and be able to monitor the screens.

 

So here’s the quick version of how to get up and running, and a link to a VERY useful pdf with more details and instructions.

 

 

More soon…for now, please email me if you aren’t able to access Clever or GoGuardian.

 

Rich Fielding

December 22, 2023 - 8:24 AM

To: District Staff

Subject: Internet Outage This Morning


All,

 

The internet has been restored as of approximately 8:05 this morning.

 

What happened!?!?

 

This morning around 5am I began a routine upgrade to the firmware on our firewall. Unfortunately, there was an “unreported” issue with the firmware version provided and by upgrading the system, I inadvertently caused the firewall to fail. I worked with our Firewall support engineer to restore our system as quickly as possible, but it took over two hours to undue the mess caused by the faulty update.

 

I sincerely apologize to those who were affected by the outage. I try to perform maintenance early in the morning so as few people are disrupted. Unfortunately, what should have taken about 10 minutes of down time wound up taking 3 hours.

 

If you have any questions or feedback, please feel free to contact me, and again, I am very sorry to those who were inconvenienced.

 

Rich Fielding

December 20, 2023 - 3:03 PM

To: District Staff

Subject: PowerSchool Offline(thread)

The PowerSchool server is back up and running.

 

Sincere apologies for the inconvenience! (though technically it WASN’T OUR FAULT)

 

Rich

 

From: Fielding, Rich
Sent: Wednesday, December 20, 2023 1:34 PM
To: District Staff
Subject: RE: PowerSchool Offline
Importance: High

 

This is not looking hopeful for an immediate resolution. I’m on the line with support now. My best estimate is we won’t be back up and running for at least an hour.

 

From: Fielding, Rich
Sent: Wednesday, December 20, 2023 1:09 PM
To: District Staff
Subject: PowerSchool Offline
Importance: High

 

All,

 

The PowerSchool server is currently, and unexpectedly offline. I am working to resolve this now. More soon.

 

Rich Fielding

December 13, 2023 - 8:32 AM

To: District Staff

Subject: Patch Tuesday, Updates, Restarts


For those with laptops running Windows, it is time for the monthly “Patch Tuesday” updates from Microsoft to start rolling out. Over the next day or two you will likely be prompted to restart your computer to finish installing the Windows updates that are getting pushed out. Please remember that when you are asked to restart the computer to finish installing updates, you should not shut the laptop’s lid until the computer has completely restarted itself. If your laptop’s lid is closed already and you are docked, don’t undock until the restart has completed.

 

Best,

 

Rich Fielding

December 7, 2023 - 3:26 PM

To: District Staff

Subject: Google Outage(thread)

No official word from Google yet, but services do appear to be working again as of about 3:05pm.

 

From: Fielding, Rich
Sent: Thursday, December 7, 2023 2:31 PM
To: District Staff
Subject: Google Outage
Importance: High

 

All,

 

There are reports from around the state that Google is not working on Chromebooks. I have received same reports from several staff and verified it on my test device as well. I will keep you posted.

 

Rich Fielding

December 5, 2023 1:40 PM !

To: District Staff

Subject: Password Reset 2nd Anniversary

For those of you who have been here for two or more years, we are reaching the anniversary of the great password reset we underwent two years ago. Staff passwords expire after 365 days, so if you are like most and only change your password when it’s required, there’s a good chance you’ll be required to change it again within the next few days.

 

So, please review the email I sent last year(below) so you know what to do!

 

Best,

Rich

 

From: Fielding, Rich
Sent: Thursday, December 8, 2022 10:27 AM
To: District Staff
Subject: Password Reset Anniversary
Importance: High

 

All,

 

There is a mandatory password reset looming for most staff (173 of you in the next 2 days to be exact and 100 more within a week) as we reach the one-year anniversary of last year’s security tightening. I say, “Most” and not “All”, because new staff hired within the last year will have 365 days from when their account was setup. Similarly, if you’re not new, but have changed your password within the last year, you will have 365 days from the date you last changed your password.

 

Please remember the following rules as you reset your password:

 

How to Change Your Password:

 

If you are using a Windows computer AND are connected to the network(this is most of us and is the preferred method):

 

If you are using a Chromebook, try to access a Windows computer on the network and use the steps above. If you cannot access a Windows computer, follow these steps:

 

If you are using a Windows computer and are NOT connected to the network:

 

What to do if this isn’t working, or you’ve locked yourself out? If that happens you will need to call the IT office at 860-365-4013 and press 0. We can only reset your password and give you a temporary one which you will still have to reset. We do NOT want to know your password so please don’t give it to us!

 

Thank you all!

 

gRInCH Fielding

November 30, 2023 - 4:22 PM

To: Middle School Staff

Subject: Chromebooks and Middle School Students

All,

 

A couple updates students may be asking you about!

 

I’ve finally made headway with inserting a “Terms of Service” to the Chromebooks when students sign in. After they sign in, they will see a new screen they have to “Accept and Continue” on. I’ve inserted the following language there:

 

~~~~~

****IMPORTANT REMINDER FOR STUDENTS****

 

District owned devices, such as Chromebooks, are for educational purposes only. Use of these devices for non-educational purposes, such as playing non-educational games, or watching videos that are not part of a teacher's assignment, are NOT allowed.

 

Attempting to search or access non-educational games, videos, websites, or other restricted content is a violation of our Acceptable Use Policy.

~~~~~

 

My testing shows that when they close their Chromebook lid, putting it to sleep, they won’t get the message again when they sign in. They only receive it after the Chromebook actually shuts down. Since getting some students to ever shut their device down is already an issue, I have put in place a rule that forces a Chromebook to automatically restart after 14 days. When the 14 days is up, students will receive a notification to restart and can only defer that for 24 hours before it happens automatically.

 

Finally, my apologies to the grammar police among you. If anyone wants the job of being my proofreader, the job is available but pays nothing. 😉

 

Rich Fielding

November 29, 2023 - 5:40 PM

To: District Staff

Subject: RE: Server Outages the Evening beginning at 5pm


All,

 

The maintenance window is now closed and servers and services are all back online. Services outlined below were affected for approximately 10 minutes between 5:10 and 5:20pm.

 

Apologies again for the last-minute notice and the ensuing disruption. Especially to those in Parent Teacher conferences at Memorial and Center Schools this evening.

 

Best,

 

Rich

 

From: Fielding, Rich
Sent: Wednesday, November 29, 2023 1:48 PM
Subject: Server Outages this Evening beginning at 5pm
Importance: High

 

All,

 

I apologize for the late notice. This evening we need to take several servers offline for emergency maintenance. The following services will be impacted beginning around 5pm and could be off for up to three hours.

Services affected:

Student Data Dashboard – dashboard.easthamptonct.org will be unavailable

Printing – Printing to most printers and copiers in the schools will not work

Wireless devices – if you are on the wireless network you’ll likely be fine. However, if you disconnect you may not be able to reconnect until the maintenance window is over.

 

I will send an update when the maintenance window is over.

 

Rich Fielding

November 15, 2023 - 9:00 AM

To: District Staff

Subject: Important Technology Announcement for Windows users, Ticketing, Update Tuesday, Patching, and Restarting


All,

 

First, I apologize for the long subject line! I’m trying to cover a lot in this one email. It’s important for all WINDOWS computer users to read. Chromebook users can safely disregard.

 

Over the last month we’ve been bringing a patch management system, called ManageEngine Endpoint Central, online. All WINDOWS computers have this program installed on them as an agent. The agent icon is probably hiding in your System Tray(the area by the clock) right now. It looks like this,<Image 1>, though sometimes it’s grey, which is no big deal. This agent reports back to our server and lets us know when the software on your machine needs patching or updating, then allows us to install those fixes remotely. These patches are sometimes to address security vulnerabilities, and sometimes they are to improve your system’s performance. Most of the time you won’t even know it’s happening(we’ve deployed dozens of patches already). But sometimes you will, and you’ll be told your machine is going to restart. The notice from Endpoint Central looks different than the usual Windows Update notification. It will tell you the computer is restarting in a certain amount of time, and will usually let you delay the restart one time, for up to 4 hours. That notice looks like this: <Image 2>

 

Another feature of Endpoint Central is that it is directly connected to our Trouble Ticket system, and so it gives you a new, simpler, and faster way to enter technology trouble tickets.

<Image 3> 

Of course, you can continue to use the form I have linked at the bottom of all my emails if you prefer.

 

Finally, yesterday was “Update Tuesday”, which is the second Tuesday of each month and is when Microsoft releases a monthly update to Windows. You can expect, that due to the Microsoft update as well as the patches we are deploying, that your computer will likely need to be restarted at least once over the next 24-48 hours. Possibly, twice. Some of these updates will take a few minutes, so please plan accordingly.

 

Thank you!

 

Rich Fielding

Image 1

Image 2

Image 3

October 30, 2023 - 11:54 AM !

To: District Staff

Subject: UPDATE: ParentSquare Issue

ParentSquare support says they have implemented a fix and are monitoring the system. It has definitely improved, however I’m still noticing some lag when loading pages.

 

They provided the following page to follow for status updates. https://status.parentsquare.com/

 

From: Fielding, Rich
Sent: Monday, October 30, 2023 11:15 AM
Subject: ParentSquare Issue
Importance: High

 

All,

 

It appears that ParentSquare is currently experiencing some technical issues. I am attempting to get an update from them on when service will be restored.

 

Rich Fielding


October 18, 2023 11:28 AM

To: District Staff

Subject: Internet Connectivity(thread)

There were some noticeable disruptions, so I’ve switched it back to the way it was before. Thanks to those who reached out!

 

Rich

 

From: Fielding, Rich
Sent: Wednesday, October 18, 2023 9:49 AM
To: District Staff
Subject: Internet Connectivity
Importance: High

 

All,

 

After a doubling of our capacity and a couple weeks of testing, I have just turned back on a more aggressive content filter for our internet traffic. If you notice significant changes to your, or your students’, internet over the next few hours, please let me know.

 

Thank you!

 

Rich Fielding

October 17, 2023 - 1:22 PM !

To: District Staff

Subject: Antivirus Pop-Up

All,

 

There is a SentinelOne upgrade being pushed out to the Windows computers around the district. SentinelOne is our Antivirus software.

 

Over the next 24 hours, you may get a notification that Antivirus has been disabled. This is normal and occurs during the brief time when the current version shuts off and the new version starts up.

 

If you don’t see any message, it’s nothing to worry about. I can see which machines have and have not been updated and will make sure we follow up with those that fail to upgrade successfully.

 

All the best!

 

Rich Fielding

October 5, 2023 - 11:05 AM

To: District Staff

Subject: Edpro Link

All,

 

If you are using Impero Edpro, please make sure you are using the updated link: https://useast.edpro.cloud and then sign in with Microsoft.

 

The old link was working intermittently (https://edpro.cloud) , but we’ve gotten a few tickets about this old link no longer working.

 

Rich Fielding


September 22, 2023 - 3:47 PM !

To: District Staff

Subject: Internet Slowness

Website students were attempting to connect to:

Number of Students affected:

Student’s location:

Time the issue started:

Time the issue resolved(if it did):

 

<START READING HERE>

 

All,

 

We are experiencing a very bizarre, intermittent, slowness of the internet during parts of the day. Today it was from around 8:30 to 10:30, and then again from 1:30 to 2:15. It seems to be isolated to Chromebooks that are going through the iBoss content filter.

 

I have opened an urgent case with iBoss to get to the bottom of this. I expect we will probably still be seeing issues on Monday and I will be monitoring them closely looking for answers.

 

For the time being please report back related issues as a reply to this email and fill out the fields I have listed at the top of this message.


Thanks, and have a great weekend!

 

Rich Fielding

September 22, 2023 - 8:43 AM !

To: District Staff

Subject: Scheduling Windows Laptop Updates - READ ASAP


This is IMPORTANT for all staff who have been issued a Windows Laptop. This is NOT for Chromebooks.

 

The Technology Department needs to perform updates to all Windows devices on a regular basis. Most of the updates are for security purposes, and many of those are done automatically. However, there are still a lot that must be done manually by an IT staff member with administrative credentials. Rather than interrupt teaching and planning to perform these updates, we have devised an after-school maintenance schedule.

 

Staff with Windows laptops must sign up for a day where they will leave their laptop after school so IT staff can perform this routine maintenance. Please, at your earliest convenience, put your name in this linked Google Sheet(link removed) and then mark your calendar so you remember to leave your device at school for the evening. Please note that the sheet has tabs for each school and there are only 15 slots available per day, since we won’t be able to get through more than that in the limited time we have each afternoon. We will also need staff to bring their laptop to a central location on their chosen day, and that is also where you will pick it up the next morning.

 

Rich Fielding

September 18, 2023 - 1:42 PM

To: Middle, Center, and Memorial Teachers

Subject: iReady/Clever Login (thread)


FYI, it looks like Teachers are also being asked to sign into iReady with Clever. If you’ve never signed into Clever, then your password should be your staff ID number(located on your badge). If that doesn’t work, let me know and I’ll reset your password for you. Your user ID is your email address.

-Rich

 

From: Fielding, Rich
Sent: Monday, September 18, 2023 9:18 AM
To: MiddleSchoolTeachers; CenterSchoolTeachers; MemorialTeachers
Subject: IReady/Clever Login

 

If your students are having any difficulty signing into iReady this morning, please note that they may be getting prompted to “Sign in with Clever”. This is okay to do. If they are having issues signing in with Clever, CALL ME and I can quickly fix the issue. About 1% of students need their password reset in Clever and I am standing by to take care of it. It’s better I do it with you on the phone and they can quickly check that it’s working.

 

Rich Fielding

September 11, 2023 - 2:31 PM

To: District Staff

Subject: Student Chromebooks need restarting

All,

 

Chromebooks issued to Students will need to be restarted every few weeks to finish installing the updates Google pushes out. Students who just open and close the lid of their device will eventually be forced to restart, but that can be disruptive. So, I’d like you to encourage students to restart when they see the little arrow symbol by the clock which indicates a restart is required.

 

For those of you who are missing students in Impero Edpro, this is the first thing to check on the devices that are missing.

 

Thanks,

 

Rich Fielding

September 6, 2023 - 11:47 AM

To: District Staff

Subject: RE: Impero Edpro Down

Quick update, the server was restored a little while ago. Apologies for the delayed update

 

From: Fielding, Rich
Sent: Wednesday, September 6, 2023 10:11 AM
To: District Staff
Subject: Impero Edpro Down

 

FYI, The Impero server is currently offline. I have a support ticket in with Impero to fix it ASAP.

 

Rich Fielding 

August 31, 2023 - 10:51 AM

To: District Staff

Subject: Impero/Edpro Outage

All,

 

Sometime in the near future, possibly within the hour, Impero Edpro will be going offline as support does some quick maintenance to our system. Once that’s done, all class rosters should be updated to the current term.

 

Apologies for the disruption.

 

Rich Fielding

August 24, 2023 - 4:12 PM

To: District Staff

Subject: Personal Access to WiFi

All, but especially those who are now, or will be soon, using the RedRover system to Clock-in and Clock-out,

 

In addition to the Kiosks located in each school, staff have the option to use the RedRover app on their personal Apple or Android cell phones to Clock-in and Clock-out. The key to using the app for this purpose is that the device has to be connected to one of the District’s wireless networks.

 

At each school there is a guest wireless network which we’ve just increased the speed of to support you. Once you join the network, you should be prompted to enter your username and password. Please keep in mind that all our networks, including these guest wireless networks are filtered and logged. We do NOT decrypt your traffic on the guest wireless, so your searches and passwords will stay private. However, we will still be blocking access to sites that are inappropriate, such as violent, adult, and gambling webpages.

 

The Guest Wireless networks for staff to use for personal devices are as follows:

 

Memorial: “Memorial Guest”

Center: “Center Guest”

Middle School: “Middle Staff” is for staff only and is password protected to prevent student access. The password is <redacted>

High School: “EHPS Guest” This network is open to students as well.

 

It is very difficult for IT to support personal devices because they come in so many variations with so many different options and security. For that reason we’ve tried to make accessing the guest wireless as simple as possible while maintaining essential security. If you are unable to connect, please enter a trouble ticket(link below), but understand that we may not be able to help you.

 

Thank you, and I wish you all a great 23-24 School Year!

 

Rich Fielding