When it comes to summer work, Rush-Henrietta's
Information Technology Services department can give us all a run for our
money! Hard-working but rarely seen in public, this department is actually three
district groups in one, Computer Services, Information Systems and our
in-district print shop, the Document and Publishing Support group, or
DPS, as they’re called. Each has distinct duties and
responsibilities, yet they work cooperatively to provide the essential,
high-quality, professional service our staff and families have come to
expect at R-H.
Computer Services is a group of 12, including nine
network technicians and a help desk manager, all of whom know their way
around a network! The district’s Five-Year Technology Plan has
had a huge impact on this group as they are responsible for every
computer device—large and small—in every building throughout the
district. This summer, the department received and processed over 1800
new devices, including teacher-assigned laptops and student Chromebooks (see the photo!).
This brings the total number of instructional computers in the district
to 6,673! All of these devices require support, tracking, and
maintenance! In addition to supporting teachers and students, Computer
Services is also the go-to group for all R-H administrative offices.
Together with Information Systems, they host the district servers and
make sure our systems are operating reliably and efficiently. In short,
they keep us connected, powered up and on the right page!
Believe it or not, summer is the busiest time for the Information
Systems group! When they aren’t busy leaping tall buildings in a single
bound, these nine staffers implement, maintain and support all of the
systems in our district that provide information! They are responsible
for filing every NYS and federal report for the district (and we all
know how easy those are to fill out!), analyzing data for enrollment and
space planning (which is essential to the district reconfiguration) and
maintaining demographic and enrollment records for all resident
students, including private/parochial, homeschoolers, preschoolers and
students in special placements. All together, that’s almost 8,000
students! For more than a year, this group has been hard at work
implementing SchoolTool, the system that replaces ParentConnect. You may
know this system as the online teacher gradebook, but what you don’t
know is that its functions include everything from initial student
registration and enrollment to scheduling, attendance, grades,
discipline and health. It’s used by more than 700 staff members, plus
all of the secondary students and parents. So that means well over 6,000
SchoolTool users! This group has our undying admiration for taking on
such a monumental task, and we ask for your patience as they continue to
work the bugs out.
The DPS group is just as busy during the
summer as they are during the school year, if not busier! The in-house
district print shop has a whopping total of three—count’em,
three—employees who print, laminate, cut, fold, bind and stuff almost
every newsletter, program, handbook, schedule, report card, brochure,
poster, workbook and flashcard in the district! They’re also experts at
proofing, layout and design! So far this summer, the ladies of DPS have
printed, folded, stuffed and mailed more than 5,600 R-H bus schedules
and 1,339 student schedules for just the high school alone! That’s just a
small sampling of the volume of their work. Like the rest of the groups
in their department, they support every school and administrative
building in the district, usually with a tight deadline, but always with
a friendly, helpful attitude and a health sense of humor.
Thank you all for everything you do!
