There's a 2-Hr Distance Learning Delay Tomorrow, Wed. 4/15

[Anonymous]

Aaaaaand now today is canceled. But tomorrow it's going to magically work. Or something like that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Aaaaaand now today is canceled. But tomorrow it's going to magically work. Or something like that.

My kids hated the online lessons anyway.

[Anonymous]

Is blackboard down?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:which school was this, in our school (Great Schools Rating of 9) they suspended elementary school kids who tried to mis-use technology.

In our school a student was suspended - out of school, at home suspended - for misuse of technology. (Great Schools 4) and in case you are worried about unequal consequences - NOT a student of color.

How were elementary students inappropriate?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What happened? What did students do online?

Since the links were opened to anyone, some classes got spammed with obscene things, including porn and explicit messages.

In addition to some high schoolers been regular a$$holes!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Is blackboard down?

Yes.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Aaaaaand now today is canceled. But tomorrow it's going to magically work. Or something like that.

My kids hated the online lessons anyway.

Your kid hated one day of it?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We literally had to execute a new contract with Blackboard Inc. today to allow the Collaborate tool to be deployed through Blackboard rather than separately. SBTS and teachers have been raising concerns about security issues on Collaborate since Day 1 this lousy tool from this overpriced, unreliable vendor was introduced to us weeks ago. Our ES deployment was very smooth today but any of us could see how easy it would be for one bad actor to completely ruin a Class.

It will all be done through Blackboard logins now which could have been the case from the get-go. Given how long FCPS has overpaid for this mostly obsolete platform that almost no one uses anymore, it’s highway robbery that we have now had to pay them even more for what should be considered very basic core functionality.

This is what happens when the decision-makers haven't been in a classroom in years (or ever) but also "know better" than teachers and tech folks on the front lines. Every teacher I know assumed we were using BBCollab because it could be automatically deployed from the SIS and require BB logins. When that turned out not to be the case it was confusing, and when we realized that the classroom links were essentially public, it was clear that FCPS admin really is clueless. Redoing the classroom links isn't really that big of a deal to me, but this is not an unknown issue and we should have had the last few WEEKS to work on this, rather than cramming it into a few hours at the last minute.

Someone (or lots of someones) at Gatehouse & Sprague should lose their job(s) over this, but instead it will be teachers who bear the brunt of the community frustration, as usual.

This is a top down issue from the school board.

100% You get what you pay for, and they didn’t want to pay to upgrade the tech. Sit in on a budget meeting. They constantly talk about how there isn’t money for things like working laptops or software, but lets buy a socio-emotional curriculum for next year.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Did your kids really just start online learning?!

I know, right? We're in western VA and my kids are almost done with all their spring quarter homework online. They've been working hard for the last month. The teachers just uploaded all the assignments to a portal and it's been fine. Zero problems. My oldest (HS) has been going to class online for one of her classes and the kids are all well-behaved, no problems. She is prepping for her AP exams that she'll take over her school-issued laptop next month. FCPS has big problems.

Not according to many on this board. It's all the parents' fault for expecting too much in the middle of a pandemic because decent teaching is impossible in these times. FCPS is doing a great job with four weeks of no instruction and total catastrophe the fifth week.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Did your kids really just start online learning?!

I know, right? We're in western VA and my kids are almost done with all their spring quarter homework online. They've been working hard for the last month. The teachers just uploaded all the assignments to a portal and it's been fine. Zero problems. My oldest (HS) has been going to class online for one of her classes and the kids are all well-behaved, no problems. She is prepping for her AP exams that she'll take over her school-issued laptop next month. FCPS has big problems.

Don't know how many students your school system has in West VA but FCPS alone has 190,000 students plus 16,000 teachers!

Just like your smart daughter, AP kids are not having problems either. We're a big county that's alll!

Not enough of a reason for moving to "West VA"....Thanks though!

AP kids aren't being taught in FCPS, they have to self teach. How is that not a problem? I knew the FCPS boosters were going to jump all over the pp. Didn't take long

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Did your kids really just start online learning?!

I know, right? We're in western VA and my kids are almost done with all their spring quarter homework online. They've been working hard for the last month. The teachers just uploaded all the assignments to a portal and it's been fine. Zero problems. My oldest (HS) has been going to class online for one of her classes and the kids are all well-behaved, no problems. She is prepping for her AP exams that she'll take over her school-issued laptop next month. FCPS has big problems.

Don't know how many students your school system has in West VA but FCPS alone has 190,000 students plus 16,000 teachers!

Just like your smart daughter, AP kids are not having problems either. We're a big county that's alll!

Not enough of a reason for moving to "West VA"....Thanks though!

Please feel free to keep your provincial NOVA attitude. It keeps you from discovering the terrific school systems we have out here that continue to function well online as I write this post. PS: letting each teacher post a group of assignments online isn't very hard. It isn't a matter of school district size. It is a matter of competence, and shedding the ego and analysis paralysis to make stuff happen. Good luck.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What happened? What did students do online?

Our ES cancelled classes.

And I’ve lost a morning of work.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Did your kids really just start online learning?!

I know, right? We're in western VA and my kids are almost done with all their spring quarter homework online. They've been working hard for the last month. The teachers just uploaded all the assignments to a portal and it's been fine. Zero problems. My oldest (HS) has been going to class online for one of her classes and the kids are all well-behaved, no problems. She is prepping for her AP exams that she'll take over her school-issued laptop next month. FCPS has big problems.

Don't know how many students your school system has in West VA but FCPS alone has 190,000 students plus 16,000 teachers!

Just like your smart daughter, AP kids are not having problems either. We're a big county that's alll!

Not enough of a reason for moving to "West VA"....Thanks though!

Please feel free to keep your provincial NOVA attitude. It keeps you from discovering the terrific school systems we have out here that continue to function well online as I write this post. PS: letting each teacher post a group of assignments online isn't very hard. It isn't a matter of school district size. It is a matter of competence, and shedding the ego and analysis paralysis to make stuff happen. Good luck.

DP. It might come to that. I hope not. The live classes yesterday were great for my kids. I hope they're able to figure it all out.

[Anonymous]

Is it possible that they didn't upgrade whatever IT things needs to happen to let 100,000 people log in at once during the past five weeks when nothing was happening?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Is it possible that they didn't upgrade whatever IT things needs to happen to let 100,000 people log in at once during the past five weeks when nothing was happening?

Imagine the expenditure.

You think the current bus fleet (which runs 3or 4 trips each morning and afternoon) is expensive? Imagine tripling it. Now think about quadrupling the network infrastructure for one quarter of one school year. Does that make sense?