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Reddit’s r_k12sysadmin Credits: @r_channels @reddit2telegram
Very Odd thing today
3 Dell 3110 2in1s and 1 3210 2in1 - had 4 kids come in today saying their keyboards were not inputting correctly, they press shift, it enters A, backspace not working, different keys just enter random letters. There are multiple keyboards added. They say they don’t know how to add keyboards, which I believe, more or less… none of these are kids that abuse or misuse their chrome books. I give them an external keyboard to enter their password, they sign in, disconnect the keyboard it still happens on the built in keyboard. Send a factory reset from GAC and they work again as expected. The kicker, asset ID for devices this happened to 2727, 2827, 2927, 3027 (asset IDs based on graduation year then student count). This all happened this morning first thing when getting to school, and it didn’t happen to any other devices. I’m guessing this is just a very strange coincidence. But it has me questioning my sanity and checking my CO detector.
https://redd.it/1qri751
@r_k12sysadmin
Catholic Schools Week
https://redd.it/1qr9zxl
@r_k12sysadmin
FYI: Securly US Issue
Securly status, in basic CIPA mode while they dig into an issue. DId see issues with AWS overnight, so wondering if related (would make sense).
Irregardless, we're seeing very limited capability for outbound connectivity at this moment. Securly has updated their status page with info:
https://securly.status.io/
https://redd.it/1qr57mb
@r_k12sysadmin
Verifying teachers - Google Classroom
I was in a Google session yesterday and I asked about the Classroom_Teachers group. We have been manually verifying them but it's a pain since there are no notifications for requests. I found that I can add a group to the Classroom_Teachers list to help with the "verified teachers" group. Do I delete ALL of the original indivdual accounts first? Will that mess up any of their current classrooms?
https://redd.it/1qqc4tq
@r_k12sysadmin
Keeping students from locking Docs?
Greetings all,
I'm curious if there's a way of keeping students from locking their Docs? I've been looking through the settings in Google Admin but not seeing anything that jumps out at me. There's options for preventing sharing but I basically want to disable the ability for students to restrict the visibility of said Docs. Granted I have ways of forcing my way into anything they lock as the Admin but that gets annoying.
https://redd.it/1qqeoep
@r_k12sysadmin
Fitnessgram - Texas
Just curious, are any of your tech departments involved in the Fitnessgram submission? No idea why, but when I took over the tech department 10 years ago, my predecessor was highly involved in inputting data and making the final submission to TEA. I, for some reason, have continued out of nothing more than tradition. The process has gotten easier since we are now able to have coaches input data directly into FG, rather than having to deal with a spreadsheet uploaded to TEA. I'm getting fed up with babysitting coaches and making sure they are completing their assigned classes and may try to put it off on athletics or principals next year.
https://redd.it/1qqmgg8
@r_k12sysadmin
Google Admin Console OU structure
What is the best structure for setting up OU's for a K12 District?
https://redd.it/1qqq9uu
@r_k12sysadmin
Chromebook location tracking (currently a GoGuardian customer using Theft Recovery)
Looking for some feedback from anyone using something other than GoGuardian Theft Recovery for Chromebook location tracking? We use it pretty heavily to recover Chromebooks that students do not turn in after withdrawing or when a Chromebook is lost or stolen but may be moving away from GoGuardian and would like to hear of other possible options and feedback on them from other people.
https://redd.it/1qkuu4r
@r_k12sysadmin
Newline vs SMART vs Clevertouch
We are installing interactive touch panels in our elementary this Summer. I've narrowed down the manufacturer to SMART, Newline, or Clevertouch. Does anyone have a reason they prefer one of these brands over the others?
https://redd.it/1ql15j6
@r_k12sysadmin
Student was able to email entire domain
I had a student today send a form to the entire domain. I was able to suspend the account and then delete the form before too many employees say it. I think the student actually added the entire directory as a contact and then sent and email to everyone. I'm talking to Google now on a solution to stop this going forward but does anyone know how to prevent students from seeing the entire directory? Do you block contacts.google.com and how do you limit who they can email. I have it setup to not allow them to email each other but it didn't really work. Any help would be appreciated, I'm so done with middle schoolers.
https://redd.it/1ql2y07
@r_k12sysadmin
Google Workspace Education Foundation + SCEP Certs - Is it possible?
Hi there,
Just looking for a bit of a sanity check... I mostly work on the Entra/Azure side of things and rarely touch things in our Google environment. However I'm trying to eliminate some old wireless SSIDs and ideally I'd like to deploy SCEP Certificates to the Chromebook and have them connect to our EAP-TLS SSID like our Intune-managed Windows devices.
Looking though Google's documentation for this, everything I'm seeing points to requiring Google Workspace Enterprise to de able to deploy SCEP certificates. Just looking to confirm my findings, or see if there's another way to go about certificate-based authentication for wireless using Workspace Education Foundation.
Thanks!
https://redd.it/1qktdrb
@r_k12sysadmin
Deldeao issues
I have been a staunch supporter of Deledao the past few years as it has worked great for us ever since their partnership with Hapara. In the past two months though their AI has really been causing us headaches. It's flagging Google Docs assignments as "adult content" and other silly categories. Has anyone else that has Deledao seen this lately? I have a ticket open with them but so far I haven't found a solution. I had to remove docs.google.com from the allowed list as that was a workaround that was allowing students to embed Youtube in slides (we have blocked Youtube as of this year). So putting that back in the Allowed list is not currently an option.
https://redd.it/1qkscff
@r_k12sysadmin
Microsoft is down and making everyone miserable, again
https://www.tomsguide.com/news/live/microsoft-down-live-updates-outage-jan-22-26
https://redd.it/1qk84iy
@r_k12sysadmin
anyone else annoyed at apple?
# iPad 11th gen missing serial from back. If the LCD is busted, and it shows up without us knowing which student it was assigned to, how are we supposed to identify a non-responsive iPad for warranty repair/replacement
https://redd.it/1qk2g5n
@r_k12sysadmin
Vasion Print/PrinterLogic and PaperCut
Hey all. I wanted to see who else has been using Vasion Print and how things have been going for you, as well as ask about Papercut and how that compares? I know it's pretty difficult to compare each solution because there are some vast differences. We currently have Vasion print deployed in our environment and have had fairly minimal issues, but there are some small ticks that I know would be a huge improvement if we swapped over to Papercut and brought everything on prem. We utilize the Print release queues for Vasion and the biggest gripe from teachers is that the job won't pull if their machine goes to sleep/lid gets closed/etc. That goes away with a papercut server.
We just started really diving into print management and so I'm trying to figure out the best solution for our teachers. Thank you in advance for any help and info you have!
https://redd.it/1qj3wxc
@r_k12sysadmin
Denver’s decision to block ChatGPT
https://k12techtalkpodcast.com/e/snow-day-anthems-denvers-chatgpt-shutdown-%e2%80%94-ep-248/ and all major podcast platforms
The second half of this episode is an interview with Dr. Richard Charles, CIO for the Denver Public Schools. Dr. Charles discusses Denver’s decision to block ChatGPT for students and staff over privacy, safety, and compliance concerns, explains the district’s AI governance and procurement changes, and outlines criteria for safe vendor adoption (data privacy agreements, visibility and guardrails).
https://redd.it/1qrc5ks
@r_k12sysadmin
Cisco Umbrella - Chrome Extension - Cisco Security for Chromebook Client
Hello,
With the mess of Securly today, and other issues, we've been looking for alternative filtering solutions. We have been experimenting with the Cisco Umbrella Chromebook / Chrome browser extension as potential replacement. This is free for us through the state of IL/ICN, so the price point is right. I just wanted to see if anyone else has tried this route and, if so, what pain points to expect.
https://redd.it/1qr6ma5
@r_k12sysadmin
Classroom management/monitoring application
We use we use Microsoft Windows and I am looking for alternatives for classroom management for teachers to use. We currently use DyKnow, and while I am not unhappy with it, since it has been bought out, I understand that there are no more improvements being made to the platform. What are others using for classroom management?
https://redd.it/1qps0m6
@r_k12sysadmin
Allow students to fill out forms but not create them
Hi Everyone,
Has anyone sucessfully disabled the ability to create form on a student OU but still allow them to fill out ones created by teachers? I reached out to Google but was unable to get this working. I aslo tried to block the main page with Go Guardian but it also blcoked quizes made with forms by teachers. Google tried to tell me in a support call you could disable forms and they wouldn't be able to create them but still fill them out. This obviously didn't work. Any ideas?
https://redd.it/1qqaeiv
@r_k12sysadmin
Recommendations for VPN/Remote Access solutions?
We have a user-base of around 30-40 folks that need remote access to various systems and we're wanting to find a solid solution, preferably that leverages Google for SSO and 2-SV.
Ideally looking for something affordable and reasonably simple and stable. Also wanting to steer clear of any Linux or open source solutions, as that's unfortunately not an option for us.
What are folks recommending to check out, as well as avoid? Appreciate any insight.
https://redd.it/1qqhnvl
@r_k12sysadmin
ChatGPT and Gemini giving this prompt to teachers today
Had teachers messaging me today about getting similar messages in both ChatGPT and Gemini. I haven't changed anything in either place (that I know of). Any ideas?
*this is from Gemini with a teacher in a teacher OU
https://preview.redd.it/8qj1003gmegg1.png?width=1238&format=png&auto=webp&s=c844b06ca87274eba6f4d5873029ac9c13dad1d9
https://redd.it/1qqu0i7
@r_k12sysadmin
Chromecasts not showing up
Good morning all, just checking if anyone else is having issues with their Chromecasts not showing up to cast to. Issue started this morning and seems to be spreading to more devices. We're a school district in NJ.
https://redd.it/1qkt23d
@r_k12sysadmin
Google Admin Directory Structure
I've been looking into solutions for blocking core services (e.g., Gmail) for individual users and am really wanting to avoid creating nested OUs for this as I'm worried about the possibility of it getting too cluttered.
After discussing with GWS support, they suggest having the services turned off at the OU level, and using security groups to enable services as needed.
For my fellow GWS administrators, I'm curious how you tackle your OU structures and if you have any good advice/tips/best practices you could impart?
TIA
https://redd.it/1qkyg9m
@r_k12sysadmin
Finalsite broke read only Friday rule--you may be locked out.
Both my webmaster and I found when we logged into Finalsite CMS today they had implemented a mandatory password change due to a change in their security requirements. Problem is, the self-service password reset wasn't working. We never received the e-mail when it got to that stage of the process. I had to contact Finalsite support to have them process a password change for me.
Not a huge deal, but with the winter storm for much of the country this weekend, many of us might be trying to get into the CMS to post updated info. Hopefully they have fixed whatever e-mail issue they were having; but you may want to try to log in sooner rather than later.
https://redd.it/1ql8h87
@r_k12sysadmin
Senate Hearing on Screen Time
https://k12techtalkpodcast.com/e/screen-time-showdown-senators-students-school-tech/ and all major podcast platforms
On this episode we talk about free certifications, Google Gemini updates, and updates to Microsoft’s Copilot Teach and Study & Learn Agents. We discuss SSL certificate lifetime changes and ACME automation. Finally, we unpack and react to last week’s Senate hearing on screen time led by Senator Ted Cruz - including perspectives from Dr. Jean Twenge and Senator Markey.
Senate Hearing on Screen Time:
https://www.c-span.org/program/senate-committee/lawmakers-hold-hearing-on-the-impact-of-screen-time-on-kids/671683
https://redd.it/1qkyt14
@r_k12sysadmin
Headphone extender suggestions
We've got tablets for our younger kids, and we've had more than a few problems with their headphones. Looking for a 1/8 headphone jack extender to fit through cases hopefully that's better quality and purchased in bulk (60ish.)
https://redd.it/1qkuyyx
@r_k12sysadmin
Dell 3120 2in1 chromebook LCD source question
Anyone using these have a good source for the LCD that isn't super expensive? I can't seem to find from Alibaba or Ebay like I used to. Ag parts has them but they are 100 a piece. They are hard to find since there is a latitude 3120 too. The one time I found some on amazon the camera hole was slightly off so the camera wouldnt work. Any good sources?
https://redd.it/1qk94la
@r_k12sysadmin
Digital Signage/Rise Vision
For those of you that have Digital Signage especially Rise Vision, what hardware do you use to show it? We have a bunch of dell micro pcs that work great but don't support Windows 11. I had started moving them off Windows 10 and originally installed Ubuntu LTS, but I didn't like the not being able to remotely manage them for updates. I then tried Chrome OS flex set it up perfectly on the first micro pc and it seemed like the answer to my prayers. Unfortunately the first pc was the only one i got to work with the Rise Vision app. I tried 3 more micro PC, installed chrome os flex, setup kiosk mode with the Rise Vision app, app opens and just spins. I contacted Rise Vision support, their dev team looked into it and said Chrome OS flex doesn't work with the Rise Vision Progressive Web App like it does for regular Chrome OS.
Anyone have any ideas on why it worked for one pc but not the others? I'd really like to get it working with chrome os flex and have one less portal to manage devices in.
Alternatively do you have any suggestions for remotely managing Ubuntu updates preferably for free.
https://redd.it/1qk70bp
@r_k12sysadmin
Can not access speaker notes in Slides
The line at the bottom you pull up is not there. If you refresh the page it shows up for 2 seconds so if you are fast you can pull it up.
Anyone contacted Google yet and was told about plans to fix it.
https://redd.it/1qjwdbt
@r_k12sysadmin
Apple Classroom
Alright
Our teachers love to use Apple Classroom to monitor/manage their student's iPads on the fly. I agree, I think it's a super cool and useful tool... when it works.
We have found that it is extremely unreliable most of the time. There's always at least 1 student iPad (and up to all of them) that either don't show the ability to join a class, or never re-connect after joining.
It is incredibly frustrating. Has anyone else experienced this? Did you find a reliable fix? We're at a loss. I don't think it's network related, as it does work for some. We have separate Staff and Student WLANs, each with their own VLAN. Any combination of connection to both of these WLANs doesn't fix the issue.
The best advice we've been able to give teachers is to make sure their iPad and the student iPads are on the latest (same) version of iOS. This does work sometimes, but as you all probably know, this isn't exactly feasible, especially between minor versions.
https://redd.it/1qiyhea
@r_k12sysadmin
