Welcome Back to School!! What's New from Technology?

For Students:

Standard desktop image for Student Chromebooks 

Based on numerous requests from teachers we have set a standard desktop background image for all student Chromebooks. Students will not be able to change this background.  The image looks like this...

Google Hangouts is now blocked for students 

Based on numerous requests from teachers and our inability to monitor these conversations we will now be blocking Google Hangouts for students.  Students who need to converse around projects or school work are encouraged to open a Google Document so they can "chat" within the document.  Google Hangouts is still available for all teachers and staff.

Login using QR codes for our K-2 students

Have you ever wondered if there was a better way for our K-2 students to login on the Chromebook?  Well there is.  Teachers now have the ability to print QR codes for their K-2 students that will allow the students to login by showing that QR code in front of the Chromebook camera.  Details and directions are included in this PDF.

Student/parent calendar link

Would you like to see the breaks, semester starts/ends, and vacations within your district Google calendar?  You can now do so by subscribing to the student/parent calendar.  Click on that link to add this calendar to your Google calendar.

For Teachers:

New Schoology features

Over the course of the last 6 months Schoology has added a number of additional features.  Here is a quick rundown of the highlights that apply to ECS.

• Teachers can now Individually Assign materials of any type...including Individually Assigning Folders
• Partial Credit can be given for Multiple Choice Questions in Course Assessments
• Teachers can now Grade by Question for Assessments
• Teachers can monitor student progress live during Assessments

Newsela Licensing Change

At the start of the summer Newsela made an important change to their licensing model that will limit the amount of content teachers can access for free. 

Beginning with the 2019-2020 school year, news content will remain available in the free version, but alignments to standards will no longer be visible without a paid subscription. Moving forward Newsela's 20+ other genres of content, like primary sources, reference texts, pro/con paired texts, and historical documents, and the standards each text aligns to, will now require a Newsela subscription.  

At this time ECS will not be purchasing the a Newsela subscription.  More details on the content and features that will make up Newsela's free and paid products moving forward can be found here. 

GoGuardian: Same great program...fresh new look

Over the summer GoGuardian has rolled out a fresh new look.  You can see the interface changes side by side in this PDF... but here are some of the highlights;

• Ability to run commands directly from a student’s tile in screens view and from enlarged student screens
• Better visibility of commands (ex: Snapshot button is static, no hovering required)
• All live classrooms will appear in the main navigation
• Ability to scroll through timeline view

Some of you might be asking, "What's GoGuardian?" GoGuardian is an easy to use classroom management tool that helps teachers gain a view into student online activity and control over their Chromebooks.  We have district licensing for GoGuardian so please reach out to a member of the EdTech team to get access to this great tool.

Staff calendar link

Would you like to see the staff specific breaks, semester starts/ends, and vacations within your district Google calendar?  You can now do so by subscribing to the staff calendar.   Click on that link to add this calendar to your Google calendar. link to add this calendar to your calendar.

For Everyone:

RapidIdentity UI change

Many of you are familiar with the tool we call "RapidIdentity" (aka https://login.eagleschools.net)  Soon the IT Operations team will be releasing version 2 of the RapidIdentity Portal.  It will be called "ECS Portal" and you'll access it the same way you always have.  It will just have a new look and feel.  You can check out a sneak peek of the new page here.


There will be an opportunity to opt into the new look early and we'll notify you before the change is made.

Content filter change

In order to provide enhanced filtering & visibility
with web filtering, cyberbullying monitoring, and self-harm alerts, the IT Operations team is transitioning all ECS internet traffic to a new internet content filter.  The filter block page may look different but the same content should be blocked as it was before.  You can test this by going to unsafewebsite.com while on an ECS campus (This is not actually not a bad site but setup by for testing the filter.)  If you have any questions or would like to request any changes the filter, to block or unblock, please contact the Technology HelpDesk!

HelpDesk:

There are now 2 ways to contact the HelpDesk

Call us

970.328.9088  or  x9088

• Speak with a live person M-F 8a-4p
• Chat with our HelpDesk
• Calling outside of business hours? Just leave a voicemail and we'll call you back.

Submit Online

• Submit a help request online from school or home