Technical Integration 6 Week Plan
Week 1 Building a Plan & Setting Goals
- 1. Participate in a kick-off meeting with your project team (manager, technical, marketing, etc.)
- Notify your project team of proposed 'Go Live' date and marketing plan.
- Obtain green light approval from your legal rep to deploy Google Apps
- Consider the following questions:
- Who will be using Google Apps?
- Students, faculty/staff, alumni
- Will certain users have access to different services than other users?
- 2. Take a look at what other schools have done by browsing through customer testimonials.
- 3. Sign up for a Google Apps account at http://www.google.com/a/cpanel/education/new.
- Create account for production or 'live' domain. Some popular Google Apps domain name choices are @school.edu, @student.school.edu, @mascot.school.edu, @school.k12.st.us.
- Activate account by verifying domain ownership. Instructions are also located in the administrator Control Panel.
- Add domain aliases or multiple domains to your Google Apps account with your Control Panel.
- Note: If you're planning to manage multiple domains from one Google Apps account, please take a look at the current limitations.
- Take a look at information regarding the new Google Apps infrastructure.
- [Optional, highly recommended] Create account for 'test domain' (i.e., pilot.school.edu). This will allow you to test your deployment plans before attempting implementation on your production domain. The test domain will also be a useful place to test new features or changes to your implementation after your go live.
- 4. Develop scheme and dates for the following technical requirements.
- Creating user accounts
- Authentication to Google Apps
- Authentication straight to Google (passwords are stored at Google)
- Single Sign-On Implementation (users are authenticated against LDAP server)
- Note: SSO only works when accessing Google Apps via the web interface. If users will be accessing will be accessing via mail clients or mobile devices they will need to have a password stored within Google Apps. You can sync passwords to Google Apps and still use single sign-on.
- Migrating user data
- Mail architecture and delivery
- Marketing
- 5. [Optional] Sign up with partners to assist with technical requirements. Take a look at the Google Apps Marketplace for more information.
Week 2 Testing the Product
- 1. Get acquainted with services (Email, Calendar, Docs, Sites, Video, Contacts, Chat)
- On your test domain, create a pilot group of user accounts to test the services
- Notify staff of intended timeline for user-facing changes
- Schedule training session for help desk employees
- 2. Test provisioning users
- 3. [Optional] Begin implementing Single Sign-On
- 4. [Optional] Test email migration
- Working with scripts during your Google Apps deployment to change configurations? Take a look at our Google Apps APIs and our Client Libraries and Sample Code
Week 3 Testing Mail Delivery Setup
- 1. Test mail delivery setup (recommended on the test domain). For more information on the types of delivery, please refer to Week 1.
- For dual delivery, ensure that you're able to receive mail at both locations
- For email routing, ensure that mail for specific email addresses is delivered to the correct location
- If you're using an inbound gateway, ensure that mail is passed through your server and still reaches Google Apps
- 2. Check in with your project team
- Update with questions/concerns/changes
Week 4 Customizing and Modifying
- 1. Customize account with information unique to your school
- Upload a logo that your users will see when using services
- Customize the 'login page' for users (if you're not using SSO, you can modify the school title, box color and logo)
- Provide your school's help desk contact information for 'User Support'
- Enable contact sharing so that users can find email address of other users at your school
- 2. Make modifications on technical requirements
- Ensure that you have an updated plan for implementing the following
- Single Sign-On
- Provisioning user accounts
- Data migration
- Mail architecture and delivery
Week 5 Implementing the Plan
- 1. Complete Single Sign-On implementation
- 2. Provision user accounts
- 3. Migrate user data
- 4. Implement your marketing plan
- Notify your students
- Print marketing collateral
- Host info session/demo session (i.e. consider a tale in your school's quad)
- Post an online internal FAQ about the switch. Feel free to link to the Google Apps End User Help Center.
- 5. Check in with your project team
- Update with questions/concerns/changes
- 6. Setup your Help Desk operations
Week 6 Ignite!
- 1. Complete marketing plan
- 2. Complete any remaining provisioning
- Create groups
- Create email accounts
- 3. Choose date/time of day to implement email architecture changes
- Go live with Google Apps at your school!
Technical Integration 10 Week Plan
For more information on running a pilot, see the Google Apps Pilot Guide.
Week 1 - Pilot Phase 1
- Kickoff call with your project team
- Notify your project team of proposed 'Go Live' date and marketing plan.
- Obtain green light approval from your legal rep to deploy Google Apps
- Figure out who will be using Google Apps, what services you'll be deploying, what services your users will be able to access and how you'll set up your organizational structure
- Sign up Google Apps for test domain account athttp://www.google.com/a/cpanel/education/new and verify domain ownership
- Add domain aliases or multiple domains to your Google Apps account with your Control Panel.
- Develop schemes for the following
- Creating user accounts
- How users will authenticate to Google
- Migrating user data
- Mail architecture and delivery
- Marketing
Week 2 - Pilot Phase 2
- Get acquainted with Google Apps services
- Test SSO on your test account
- Test provisioning on your test account
- Sign up with partner if additional assistance is needed
Week 3 - Pilot Phase 3
- Test data migration on test account
- Check in with project team (address questions/concerns/changes)
Week 4 - Pilot Phase 4
- Test Google Apps product suite and make customizations to sharing settings as if it will be the live domain
Week 5 - Building the Plan
- Sign up for Google Apps account - http://www.google.com/a/cpanel/education/new - and verify live domain
- Develop plans for your live domain:
- Marketing
- Provisioning
- Message delivery (dual delivery, email routing, straight to Google MX, gateways)
- SSO implementation (if applicable)
- Migration (if applicable)
Week 6 - Testing the Product- Phase 1
- Perform further testing of account provisioning
- Perform further testing of migration of existing mail (if applicable)
- Perform further testing of SSO implementation (if applicable)
Week 7 - Testing the Product - Phase 2
- Check in with your project team (address questions/concerns/changes)
Week 8 - Customizing and Modifying
- Customize Google Apps accounts
- Upload logo
- Customize login page
- Customize support contact information (with school's help desk information)
- Enable contact sharing
- Make modifications to:
- SSO implementation
- Provisioning methods
- Migration strategies
- Confirm your mail architecture plans
Week 9 - Implementing the Plan
- Complete single sign-on implementation
- Migrate user data
- Implement marketing plan
- Check in with you project team (address questions/concerns/changes)
- Set up your help desk operation
Week 10 - Ignite!
- Complete marketing plan (use marketing collateral on campus)
- Complete any remaining provisioning (create email account and groups)
- Choose date to change DNS over to GoogleGo live with Google Apps at your school!
- Training Plan
- 5 Step Professional Development Plan Summary: See GDocs Here
- Step 1 Gain support from key administrators that will help drive training programs.
- Step 2 Assemble a group of Google Apps Guides who can help deliver training and ongoing development.
- Step 3 Set the scope of the plan.
- Step 4 Conduct Google Apps training across the university and build momentum and excitement for the transition.
- Step 5 Process feedback and revise the program; expand to other groups on campus.
- Some practical considerations:
- Consider timing conflicts for vacations and exam periods
- Review the training material available on this site and other Apps Edu resources
- Plan for ~7-8 weeks to prepare a Google Apps training program
- Consult with other schools or business in your area using Google Apps
- Top 10 ways to start using Google Apps
- Teachers
- Lesson Plan
- Meeting
- Translations
- Video Conferencing
- Multiple Choice Quiz with Summary
- Survey
- Sign up Sheet
- Shared Folder
- Google Sites
- Students
- Class Activity or Homework Calendar
- Classroom or administrative tasks and grouped into task lists (Cal and Gmail)
- Translation
- Google Sites template for student e-portfolio
- Tracking homework and behavior logs
- Form and spreadsheet for collecting teacher observation data and analysis
- Resource calendar (e.g. rooms, auditorium)
- Student driven vocabulary flashcard center (gadgets)
- Pen pals with other schools
- Long term and unit plans into GCal
- Google Apps Education Certified Training
- Training Center – Teach yourself to become an Apps expert in the classroom. Our six-part training course will help you prepare for our Individual Qualification exams.
- Certified Trainer program – Individuals or organizations with extensive experience in professional development and Apps training support can showcase their skills by applying for Certified Trainer status.
- Individual Qualification – Demonstrate your knowledge of Google Apps for Education by completing a structured program of six comprehensive tests. (A passing score in the Individual Qualification is a prerequisite for all Certified Trainer applicants.)
- Find a trainer – Find a Certified Trainer to lead Google Apps professional development at your school.
- Google Apps User Guides & Templates
- General Guides and FAQs
- Quick Start Guide: Two-page guide to help users log in to their Google Apps accounts for the first time. Includes basic instructions for using email and calendar.
- Getting Started Guide: Includes information about:
- Logging in to Google Apps
- Verifying migrated data (if applicable)
- Migrating data from Outlook (if applicable)
- Understanding the basic differences between Google Mail and other email programs
- Using Google Mail, Calendar, Talk, and Tasks
- Getting Started Guides - By Feature: Most of same content in the Getting Started Guide, but with each major section as a separate template document. Use these modules as standalone "getting started" guides for each feature, or combine them to create your own user guide.
- Google Apps FAQ: A list of questions that new users often ask about using Google Mail, Calendar, and Contacts; and about using Google Apps with mobile devices. Intended as a "repository" from which you can pull out questions into your own FAQ
- Recommended Gmail and Calendar Labs: A list of Gmail and Calendar Labs that are especially useful for enterprise users. Use this template only if you're enabling Labs for your users.
- Transition Guides
- Role Specific User Guides
- Mobile User Guides
- 32 Ways to Use Google Apps for Students
- Google Docs
- Collaborative Group Papers and Projects
- Lecture and Study Notes (all in one place)
- Student Group Repository (Club minutes, budgeting/finance, )
- Data Collection
- Sign up sheets
- Flash cards for classes or test prep
- Class Presentations
- Forms
- Collecting Student Feedback
- Event Signup and Invites
- Interview Questionnaires
- Student Group Membership
- Committee Staffing
- Research Data for Project or Thesis
- Google Calendar
- Events
- Personal Organisation
- Organise Task and Deadlines with Shared calendars
- Coordinate Group Meetings
- Set SMS/Text reminders
- Gmail
- Link and send from multiple accounts
- Message Translation
- Filtering and Rules
- Talk
- Video Chat
- Phone Call or SMS from Gmail (US only?)
- Sites
- School Newspaper
- Portfolios
- Group Pages
- Project Sites
- Additional Training Resources