Future Proofing

 “Future proofing means that a facility anticipates and supports educational change without expensive remodeling,” (Boschee, Jensen, & Whitehead, 2013, p. 200). In a system like mine, future proofing to meet this definition is impossible. With most of our buildings 40+ years old, we are well past any future proofing they may have had. With most facilities being outdated, I look toward other areas to try and future proof our system.

            I feel that G Suite has helped us future proof a lot. For my entire education career, we were on an old webmail system provided by Alabama Super Computer (ASC). This system was very simple and dated. It had very little functionality and even less threat detection. We also have a local file sharing server. With the introduction of G Suite, we are able to access the added functionality of Gmail and use Google Drive for file sharing. This also allowed us to increase the use of Google Calendar across the district. See more about the benefits of G Suite here.

Last year Bibb County had a unified wireless solution installed in all of our instruction buildings. "The direction is for schools to go wireless," 

(Boschee, Jensen, & Whitehead, 2013, p. 202).This solution allows us to connect up to 30 devices per classroom and many more in common areas. This solution can also be expanded pretty easily to grow with the demand. This solution is integrated with our Active Directory so that every student and teacher with a computer account can also securely access wireless.

Bibb County also recently finished replacing all of the switches within the district. Before making this change we had switches from four different manufacturers. Out of those switches some only supported up to a 100 Mbps connection. Now that we have made the transition, all of our switches are the same brand and they are compatible with our wireless solution. This will allow us to monitor and manage both solutions from one console.

            We are also in talks with AT&T about moving to a digital solution for our telephone service. Right now each school has two copper phone lines that connect with our VOIP system. Moving to the digital solution will not only remove the problematic copper lines, but will also save the district thousands of dollars per month on our phone bill.

            Another solution we are looking at is the Blackboard App for our district. This will allow us to communicate with parents without trying to keep up with phone numbers. The parents will also have the ability to check news from their student's school and also view their students grades and lunch accounts from a central location. "Other technologies are helping districts improve infrastructure efficiencies and reduce costs in functions like communication and alerts," (Dessoff, 2010).

References

Boschee, F., Jensen, D., & Whitehead, B. (2013). Planning for technology: A guide for school administrators, technology coordinators, and curriculum leaders. Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin, a Sage Company.

Dossoff, A. (2010) Making your schools future-proof. District Administration. Retrieved from: https://www.districtadministration.com/article/making-your-schools-future-proof

[Ruckus Networks]. (2015, September 18). Ruckus Wireless: Education in the 21^st century. Retrieved April 16, 2018, from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u9AaTk61WKw