The new school year has started and I thought I would highlight the changes that will be taking place at the beginning of this year.

1 – Upgrade to Windows 10

We had originally planned on loading Windows 10 on our machines starting late in June, but Microsoft decided to release a major upgrade to Windows 10 on August 2nd and we had to push our plans forward to start installs in August.

If your screen looks like the image below, then you are still running Windows 8.1 and your system needs to be updated.

If your screen looks like the picture below then you are running Windows 10.

2 – Upgrade to Office 2016

With the upgrade to Windows 10 you will also be receiving the latest version of Office, currently Office 2016.  Some programs have changed names such as: Lync is now known as Skype for Business.  OneDrive is now OneDrive for Business.  Any files you had previously created will now open with the new versions.  All of the new office programs will be listed at the top of the start menu once you click on “All Programs” instead of in a folder like Office 2013 was.

3 – New county technology website

The new technology website is now active with new content still being added.  All Wayne county teachers already have an account and may sign in with the same name and password you use to sign in to your computers at school.  Under the software tab you can see what software is currently on our software center that can be installed by anyone.  There is also a request tab where teachers can request new software that they would like added to the software center.  Please use the search feature under the software tab to see if the software you want is already available or has been requested and not approved to be added before you make a request.

There is also a knowledge base section that we have started and will be adding to with help from teachers.  Do you have a question about something that you think would make a good Knowledge Base article?  If so, at the bottom of any of the current Knowledge Base posts there is a section where you can ask a question and get an answer.  If you have a good question it may get turned into a Knowledge Base article.

4 – Changes to teachers laptops

All school laptops have a program installed that will make the laptops unusable after a certain number of days after it last signed on at school.  We had some issues with teachers not knowing about this and taking their laptops to training’s this summer only to find out that they couldn’t sign on or they were kicked off of the machines shortly after signing in.   See KB article

Since we have no access to laptops when they are outside of our county network we were not able to help with this issue.  We have however come up with a solution for this in the future.  All teacher laptops should have an additional option on the sign in screen after they are upgraded to Windows 10 that says VPN.  This button will only be turned on as needed.  So if you find yourself out of the county at a training and you have internet access you should be able to call the technology deportment and we can temporarily give you access to the VPN which will allow you to sign on and also give us access to your laptop if needed.  See KB article HERE

5 – Changes to Apple devices

All county-owned apple devices must migrate to our management system by September 30th 2016. Any device that has not been migrated will cease to have internet connectivity.
All schools will need to provide a list of apple devices (serial numbers and their desired names) in their school, broken into the management groups they prefer (such as a classroom). It should be relatively easy to convert your inventory list by breaking it up. Failure to provide a structured list will result in your devices being added to Profile Manager without being added to School and/or classroom management groups, making management more difficult.

More info is available HERE

ALL IPADS MUST BE PURCHASED FROM APPLE OR POMEROY!!  DO NOT PURCHASE IPADS FROM ANY OTHER VENDOR SUCH AS WALMART, BEST BUY OR AMAZON.  THEY WILL NOT SHOW UP AS BEING OWNED BY WAYNE COUNTY AND AS SUCH WILL NOT WORK BY DEFAULT ON OUR WIRELESS FROM THIS POINT ON.

6 – Changes to School Wireless

We started upgrading our wireless system last year and then we found out that some Apple devices would not be compatible with these changes.  So now we are making the changes to Apple devices and will be changing the wireless to enhance support for computers on our system.  There will be two new SSID’s that will show up on the wireless starting the 3rd week of August.  One called MobileDeviceSetup will be used to setup Apple Ipads almost automatically as long as the Ipad was purchased from Apple.  All Ipads and androids will be connected to the MobileDevices SSID.

The current wireless SSID’s at each school will go away on September 30th 2016.  Starting on August 15th there will be a new wireless SSID at all schools called WCSWireless.  All computers will be automatically moved to this new wireless system as they connect to our network.

ALL IPADS MUST BE PURCHASED FROM APPLE OR POMEROY!!  DO NOT PURCHASE IPADS FROM ANY OTHER VENDOR SUCH AS WALMART, BEST BUY OR AMAZON.  THEY WILL NOT SHOW UP AS BEING OWNED BY WAYNE COUNTY AND AS SUCH WILL NOT WORK BY DEFAULT ON OUR WIRELESS FROM THIS POINT ON.