BYO, it’s begun. Bring your own technology… bring your own devices… the trend towards personal technology being an essential tool in learning is here. School district leaders are trying to figure out how to support many different devices in their buildings as state and federal funding for education gets tighter every year. Online IT management education tools and collaboration software are another big trend. Both of these trends will only continue to grow.
This creates security problems. IT doesn’t know what’s been added or changed on student machines. Students readily download the latest freeware, use peer-to-peer networking sites for file sharing and visit social networking sites that are comprised of downloadable content from literally everywhere.
Curtailing these behaviors on school-owned assets is a huge challenge. For student-owned devices, it’s virtually impossible. Faced with a significant increase in network instability because of spyware and malware, IT teams may try to lock down all student devices. But that results in a situation where adding new peripherals or approved IT management education software becomes prohibitively time-consuming.
Challenges in Managing Expanding Technology in the Education System
As information technology increasingly drives the education system, managing an expanding technology base in a budget-constrained environment is a constant challenge. New deployments, re-imaging, maintenance, upgrades and overstretched bandwidth are just some of the obstacles. Now add high expectations from teachers, administrators and parents, short, seasonal purchasing cycles, licensing compliance requirements and the endless pressure to do more with less.
Administrators and governing boards focused on hardware and software, often dismiss the need for education systems management. Point systems management solutions resolve some issues and create others. Enterprise software packages are expensive and require big commitments in training for staffs that are already stretched thin. The result is a difficult working environment, to put it mildly.
IT professionals in education need help in supporting end users and maintaining the infrastructure to ensure continued reliability and accessibility of information. Without the proper tools, these tasks are daunting and can quickly become unmanageable. Useful, comprehensive IT management education tools put important information within reach, automate maintenance, and facilitate fast and reliable response to technical support issues.
