Finally there has been some progress with regard to solving both the bandwidth and connectivity issues that have been impeding the full development of classroom use of the Internet and all of its assciated benefits. Yes, yes, before you go off and say something like "hey we are getting benefit from the current system" yes you are but there is so much more possible. On-line access to the world at heretofore unheard of speeds or at least that is what the potential is. Internet access at local LAN speeds is what I am really trying to describe. For instance, say your ISP is receiving their Internet connection from a 45Mbps connection directly off the Commodity Internet and quite possibly a 155 Mbps connection off of an ATM connection. Our current connection is rated at 25 Mbps but due to ATM bandwidth considerations and a limitation of that bandwidth we are really receiving Intenet traffic at about 8 to 9 Mbps. What might it be like to get a full 45 Mbps or, brace yourself, 155 Mbps directly off one of the national backbones. What would be possible with this, in short, everything. What sort of access might that provide? I guess a better statement would be what sort would it not. ON-DEMAND everything, regardless of size, regardless of the type of transmission at those speeds who cares how big or how many times you want to use whatever it is. This of the pressure this could alleviate in education. At those speeds the educational facilities could be easily clustered into one central environment so that what was available to one could be made available to all participants in the network. Either one big domain, instead of GTPS everyone in our county could belong to ACTP. Filtering, virus protection, backup, monitoring, software installation, software support, video streaming, distance learning, firewall protection, spam blocking, email systems like Exchange or any of the open source systems could be made available to anyone instantly that participated on the network. Lesson plans, training videos of every kind, how to do just about everything could be made available. I realize I am missing some things since I don't always think of the classroom situations at the detail level I need to but I know I could make it better for the teachers in general if we could construct a system like this. Could we? Well there is a move afoot from Verizon that they have been working on for some time and have now decided to open it to the world, albeit in small doses at first. They are calling it TLS which stands for Transparent LAN Services and basically it consists of the construction of point to point LANs running on existing fiber that Verizon has been installing over the past twenty years or so. Up till this point it really has not made business sense to put it on the street for the general usage of us commoners. I do understand that this type of service has been available for some time in the corporate sector. They first introduced me to their plan over a year ago and swore me to secrecy. It is the reason that I dropped the microwave towers off the proposed jobs for tech services. In essence they will let us use their Central Office as a VLAN switching system so that all of our outlying connections will be able to connect up to the central MDF for the district. The outlying schools would simply be straight Ethernet connections back to the main system. This type of connectivity can be stretched out not just to our district but to every district in the county. Each of us could become a node on one big Ethernet network. Novell, Microsoft, Linux or any other operating system you are using could talk directly to this system. Thats where the fun could start. Think of the possibilities of the money that could be saved by the use of this technology in the county. I have not had the time to really brainstorm this and I have only spoken to a few folks about this but as I think about it more and more it looks very good from the services side of the house.
Things are moving ahead with the work at both schools. Images are being constructed at Charter for the five different types of machines that they are using this year. There was only enough money to replace fifty of the original units and next year we will be replacing at least one hundred of the units that are in service right now. Funds are tight and while I have gotten pretty good at getting the most for the dollar there is a limit as to just how low I can get the prices. You can't expect the vendors to just give it to you for no profit. For the most part though, as I have written in the past, times are a bit tough for the educational vendor community in general with the funding crush being placed on everyone. Next year will be more difficult than this one and I am trying ot prepare the board at Charter for the worst and maybe I won't have to pull a rabbit out of my hat again next year.
Galloway is also moving ahead with each of the projects. I spent the better part of the day looking for less expensive furniture for the media centers and the one true lab room that we are converting this summer. I have about $10,000 to spend on computer tables and chairs and wiring for all four facilities. This is becoming a challenge for me and I am going to prevail. I have the total down to about $14,000 right now and I will make the budget that I have sworn to. OK, have to go now since I promised the Gabster a little walk around the block tonight after she had a chance to recover from the dinner I made tonight. See ya next post.
7:52:34 PM 
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