Category: Educational Technology
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2016 Technology Rewind
With 2016 slipping into the history books it is time to reflect on an exciting year of technology projects at Penn Manor School District. Here are a few highlights: The year started with a ring. In January, we unveiled a new automated attendance call notification system. When a student is marked absent, their parent or…
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Mattermost – An Open Source Slack Alternative
The Penn Manor IT Team relied on a self-hosted IRC messaging server for many years. IRC is great for a technical crowd, but the old-school feel and cryptic conventions never resonated with students and teachers. We’ve experimented with IRC alternatives, but an affordable, school-friendly platform has been elusive. Slack was a promising option–and a few…
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The Power of Open in Education
Penn Manor: The Power of Open in Education, a short documentary produced by Red Hat Films, premiered on the opening night of Red Hat Summit 2015. The film features our current and former student help desk apprentices, teachers, and staff. Footage and interviews were shot during a whirlwind three day filming schedule in May 2015. A huge thank you…
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B is for Bandwidth
Blazing, brisk, breakneck, blistering–these words now describe Penn Manor’s Internet connection. The district just completed the installation of a new high speed network circuit that provides up to 1 Gigabit of Internet bandwidth. With 10 times more speed than before, the new circuit will help students and staff reach the online resources they need, without a wait. Internet service is supplied by the…
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Student Linux Laptops Presentation
At our March IU13 Technology Directors meeting, I joined several district colleagues for a sharing session on student 1:1 programs. The discussion was titled: “1:1 Implementation: Choosing the Right Device”. I spoke about our Penn Manor’s guiding principles, open source philosophy, student apprenticeship help desk program, and how Linux offers unique learning options for students and teachers. Slides from my potion…