School board receives update on district's technology

Hot Springs County School District Technology Director Josh Taylor provided an update to the school board Nov. 15, starting with a review of his department’s yearly maintenance cycles, on everything from staff computers and all the printers to the student information system and Chromebooks.

Taylor explained that the goal with the Chromebooks is to ensure students have “fresh devices,” so they’re reliable to use and not breaking down, before he thanked middle school Principal Breez Daniels for bringing him into the district’s guidance coalition, which he credited with helping him make, and advise others on how to make, more informed decisions on subjects such as software licenses.

This past summer saw the school district roll out 350 additional Chromebooks, specifically for grades 2-4, which Taylor deemed “a larger number than usual,” while 20 new laptops were placed in the district during the same cycle.

This summer also saw the technology department perform an access control upgrade, which shifted to a web-based system to afford remote access, as they additionally enacted the “common clock” project, to make the clocking-in process “easier and smoother” for a number of employees.

Taylor spent the summer of 2022 undergoing Vivi training, for the screen-mirroring tech the district has used in its boardroom and elsewhere since it was implemented two years ago, so he could help teachers further expand its utilization.

As for what the technology department is currently up to, Taylor noted that “what we do every year,” at this time of the year, “is assess what we did at the beginning of the year,” for “things we missed,” from network and firmware upgrades, to possible causes of internet outages.

Taylor elaborated that the district’s Thanksgiving and Christmas breaks are used to check cables and drill into walls, when students and teachers aren’t using the facilities, to avoid disrupting their work.

A bus loop camera that’s being installed had needed a connection, since it was “way out on a pole,” and Taylor again expressed his appreciation to Daniels, this time for initiating the installation of “probably 20 touch boards” (which Taylor clarified are the same as “smart boards”) into the classrooms.

As part of a statewide measure, the Hot Springs County School District’s internet will be upgraded from 1GB to 10GB, which will also incur the arrival of student monitoring software and a content filter change, with the current filter discontinuing this coming March, so the technology department is already planning the transition to the new filter.

And a survey has been developed to help the technology department plan its summer projects, for this coming year and beyond, based on feedback from teachers about “what they did use, what they feel like they didn’t use, and what they feel like they need more help and training on,” in Taylor’s words.

Superintendent Dustin Hunt described the school district as conservative in its spending, by taking advantage of grants and other outside funds whenever possible, and by not raising or lowering its budget very much, in regard to technology.

However, Hunt acknowledged the reality that even the most inexpensive technology is still costly, and even the best technology has finite lifespans, and credited he Taylor with helping the district run “on what Josh calls it the Honda Accord approach, rather than the Ferrari approach.”

In determining when to acquire more cutting-edge technology, Hunt asserted the district is guided by “what’s best for our students,” in terms of preparing them for advanced fields such as medical imaging.

Hunt echoed Taylor’s comments on the district’s guidance coalition, because “it’s hard for (Taylor) to do his work if he doesn’t know why he’s doing it, but if he knows the ‘whys’ behind what we’re trying to do, he can better serve our staff and students.”