The
Business Challenge
K-12
education is being supported by state and federal government efforts
to integrate computers and appropriate technology into the educational
realm. The goal hopes to combine the advantages of the Internet,
and the networking of teachers and students for an accelerated
advancement in learning. Internet technology brings about a proliferation
of tools and resources that improve the way children are educated,
and that which changes the traditional model of primarily instructor-led
classroom delivery. In response, schools and districts have made
significant purchases of equipment, and installed computers, Local
Area Networks (LAN), and Wide Area Networks (WAN).
With
this initiative comes a need not unlike that already faced by
businesses and corporation in the last two decades: How to provide
complex technical support necessary for learning to stay focused
on the use of the technology, not fixing it. Teachers are likely
to be primary users of support services as they grapple with alternative
and electronic means of information delivery.
A
second challenge is in the tracking of inventory, not traditionally
taken as a critical initiative as school equipment has commonly
been of the gym-variety type, and a collection of learning equipment,
devices, televisions that are low-cost. But with the high expense
of computer equipment, inventory management will be important.
Lax control invites theft, and non-reporting of such incidents.
Missing assets affects internal auditing purposes, especially
if teachers and school administrators cannot be identified as
accountable for the loss.
A
third challenge is in schools understanding the cost of support.
The equipment budget is likely to be allocated mostly to the purchase
of the equipment, yet the cost of support over the lifetime of
the equipment is likely to be three times more. In a budget-strapped
school, the optimal use of technical support resources is even
more paramount - needing to service large student populations
who have the same issues as their business counterparts.
NYF Response
The
funding and implementation of help desks to support schools with
technology is recommended to provide the necessary support services
to teachers and students. Help Desks and tracking systems such
as Aegis Help Desk, will help to lower support costs
through efficient management of issues and problem requests.
School
technical support staff will be given an effective mechanism to
track reported problems and issues, and make use of common occurrences
of requests to create frequently asked questions and knowledge
databases. The Aegis Help Desk client web access facility will
enable teachers and students to log on to the system using a browser
such as Internet Explorer, to initiate support requests and to
periodically check progress with around-the-clock convenience.
This web self-service can deal effectively with common procedures
that represent a large part of a support issues reported with
little instruction. They will be able to search databases created
by the support staff to get a quick response to their support
issues by entering appropriate keywords to bring up similar issues
reported and recommended resolutions. Furthermore, web front-end
technology from Aegis Help Desk enables the school support team
to be distributed - whether to work or at the school location,
further enabling after-school support. The time saved by teachers
and students self-diagnosing and resolving problems potentially
save thousands for the school if otherwise provided by a support
staff instead.
Aegis
Help Desk provides Asset Management control – this helps
to keep record asset allocations, components that make up an asset,
asset repair service history, support calls for the asset which
later translates into a detailed report of costs associated with
all the computer equipment of the school - useful for budgetary
and finance reporting purposes.
The
usage information captured by Aegis Help Desk systems can help
schools to track improved responsiveness, the cost of providing
the support, and timeliness of response as feedback for continuous
improvement initiatives.
To
learn more about Aegis Help Desk, click here.
For testimonials of customers who have used Aegis as part of their
support strategy, click here.
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