Teacher Laptops

The lease arrangement:TELA laptops are provided for all fulltime teachers at Pt England School. These are leased for three years and at the end of the three years they are returned to the leasing company and the school is eligable for a replacement. Two thirds

of the lease is paid by the MoE and the other third is paid for by the teacher. Pt England BOT have elected since 2004 to pay the lease on your behalf.The school obligation is to pay the lease regularly and to return the laptop at the end of three years in a good state of repair, in the original box, with all components intact.The laptop numbers are allocated according to the staffing records the MoE hold, so there are no 'spare' laptops.Teacher agreement:

Each teacher signs a lease agreement with the school which recognises which laptop you have received (serial number) and obligates you to

  • Keep it at school at all times - though you may take it home at nights, weekends and holidays
  • Care for it physically
  • Use it for teaching and learning
  • Follow school policies regarding laptop use
  • Understand that your work and usage is visible

Technical care and repairs:

Laptops are imaged on arrival at school with the software and systems Pt England School specifically uses. We have four accounts on each laptop

  1. Admin account - which is used by the technical team to access your system. This is to avoid us having technicians in your personal account unless there is something we specifically need to repair in your account.
  2. Teacher account - you may personalise this to suit yourself EXCEPT for the password
  3. Student - this is the only account students may use on your laptop.
  4. Guest - if for some reason someone else uses your laptop, this is the one they would use

Care of laptop

  • It lives in a protective bag. You are welcome to buy your own fashion statement if you do not want the one you are given.
  • Try to shut it down regularly - especially if it is going to be jolted about in a bag. Doing this while it is still turned on does give opportunity for things to get damaged.
  • Look after it it public places (shopping carparks, out at night etc) and at school
  • Don't bling it with stickers, markers or scratches because that costs when it is returned
  • Travelling out of town with it is YOUR responsibility. Overseas requires discussion with Russell, but is still YOUR responsibility for insurance
  • Care before repair: Run Disk First Aid regularly and keep it in fine shape! Specific note on how to do this are at the bottom of this page.

Repairs for TELA laptops are very straight forward.

  • If something goes wrong, unless we can repair it ourselves quickly it gets logged in to the TELA system and a courier comes an d takes it away for repairs. Most repairs are covered by insurance. There are only two repairs that are not covered; dead batteries (these are not insured) and accidents.
  • Anything that has to be claimed as an accident goes through a different process and we have to give your rendition of what happened as part of the claim. The excess for an accidental claim is $100 and this is met by the teacher. A very small price to pay for a new laptop every three years!
  • It is most important that repairs are carried out as quickly as convenient because some of them allow subsequent damage to occur. Please do not wait until it is due to be returned because the school has to pay for it if you handed back a laptop which should have had repairs.
  • Unlike most schools, we rarely ask for laptops to be handed in and we get them back to you quickly. Some schools collect them in for the Xmas holidays!
  • We are very happy for you to run software updates, add printers and locations and other minor techie things. We have made you an Admin user of your laptop for this reason.

Pt England Specific Protocols:

  1. Theft is one of our major laptop concerns
    1. All TELA laptops are to be locked away when not in use or with the teacher ie from during assembly through to when you leave them behind and go overseas.
  2. Breakage/Damage
    1. No student is to carry a TELA laptop outside of the classroom unless it is in the bag and over their shoulder.
    2. Students should only use TELA laptops in the presence of the teacher who is leasing it
  3. Useage
    1. Students only use TELA laptops if the teacher chooses to let this happen, logged into the Student login
  4. Downloads/Uploads etc
    1. Policies about appropriate computer useage found elsewhere apply to the laptops
    2. We specifically state
      • No peer-to-peer music downloads
        • under New Zealand law there is very little that you are legally able to download for free. You MUST be legal!
        • we do not want our networks open to other people or viruses. This means Limewire etc!
      • We ask you to be very carefull sharing files (flashdrives, software etc) with PCs. being virus free is important
      • Take responsibility for sites you use like FaceBook. Many of the FB apps you sign up to access your laptop when you are signed in to your account.
      • Pt England teachers are Cyber Smart teachers - see the Cyber Smart policy

Using a laptop:

A laptop is an integral 'tool of the trade' for a teacher in the 21st Century. The Key Competencies sum up how you should approach your own lifelong learning related to this tool.

  • Managing Self - a 'Can Do' attitude
  • Relating to others - figure out who can network with you for support in using this tool. A starting place at Pt England School is the eLearning Team and lead teachers
  • Participating and Contributing - use the tool FOR this, but also participate and contribute to someone else in your team or network who may appreciate your suppport with it
  • Thinking - a lot of issues can be resolved by taking a deep breath..... damp the panic..... and think (problem solve) EVEN if it is thinking about the right person to ask for help :)
  • Using language, symbols and text - this is THE teaching tool of this decade and we all need to give time and practise to becoming fluent in the L/S/Txts of this device

Disk First Aid:

This is like taking your car to the garage regularly for grease and oil change instead of waiting till it starts to grind and groan.

  1. Go to Applications > Utlities > Disk Utility
  2. It will open in the First Aid tab
  3. On the left choose your Hard Drive
  4. Click Repair permissions

NB: If it takes a long time, then let it. Maybe do it before you go to bed at night, so it is finished in the morning. Some machines I worked on in June needed it done over and over (like 20 times) to finally clear the backlog of problems