Blog - Five Star Technology Solutions

The Windows OS Lifecycle

Windows 10 is the next major version in the Microsoft Windows operating system family, seeing its initial release in July of 2015. As part of Microsoft’s OS lifecycle, Windows 7 and Windows 8.1 will stop receiving updates and support in January of 2020 and 2023, respectively. In addition, 7th Generation CPUs from AMD and Intel are already requiring Windows 10 for driver compatibility, so anything released after early 2017 excludes compatibility with the earlier OSes. Since Windows 10 has matured considerably since the initial release, and with the end of life of Windows 7 less than a year away, it’s definitely time to begin migrating!

In this guest post, TIS Brooke Hall (@BrookeHallTIS) describes her first encounters with CS First by Google. Brooke attended a workshop to learn more about the curriculum and to discover ways to use the lessons with students.

Guest contributor Amber Anania (@msanania) is a 7th grade language arts teacher at Westfield Middle School who recently became a Google Certified Educator Level 1. In this post, she shares her experiences preparing for and taking the qualification exam.

Indiana’s graduation pathways empower students to focus their efforts in high school on a range of careers while acknowledging that there are multiple ways to demonstrate postsecondary readiness. Overall, this initiative promises to bring significant benefits to students, families, schools, and communities. However, counselors and administrators may be left wondering how they will track every student’s pathway considering there are so many options. That’s why the Pivot team has developed an intuitive solution with several time-saving benefits.

Over the last several months, Indiana legislators and policymakers wisely amended the requirements for high school graduation to better reflect the varied and valid pathways that students pursue as adults. Rather than mandating that all students pass the same high-stakes standardized assessments to earn a diploma, students are now free to demonstrate their postsecondary readiness in ways that better reflect their interests and goals.

PyxisEdu is our “go-to” professional learning platform at Mishawaka Schools. PyxisEdu is a professional learning platform that has 201 content categories with593 videos, 513 other learning resources, and 60 collections/units. Content is created by a group of edtech pros that are25+ licensed educators with 60+ edtech certifications and 200+ school years. Teachers in Mishawaka Schools use it to harness the power of technology to move from theory to practice and fuel any time learning. PyxisEdu has professional learning resources for everyone such as blended learning, using G-Suite, telling stories digitally with Book Creator, or using Skype to invite guest speakers into your classroom. Most importantly, however, is the fact that at the core of this platform is learning. PyxisEdu is grounded in a strong learning theory that goes beyond just integrating education technology. Our teachers immerse themselves in resources like learning style theories, universal design for learning, and leadership strategies while getting credit for their learning with the PyxisEdu Professional Growth Point (PGP) tracker.

Your school has a shiny new PyxisEdu subscription. Congratulations, you’ve taken the first step in providing your teachers a personalized approach to professional development! As a building leader, you understand the powerful benefits that PyxisEdu provides for your teachers. You know about the resources rooted in strong pedagogy, the professional growth tracking, and the digital badging that helps your teachers display their strengths and interests. You can’t wait to see how your staff uses this new program to amplify their professional learning.

One way to upgrade your school network infrastructure is by tapping into the dollars available via the federal E-Rate program that is administered by the Universal Service Administrative Company (USAC). E-Rate provides discounts to eligible schools and libraries in the United States in order to ensure access to affordable telecommunications and information services.

Ah, the life of an eCoach. You are the cheerleader, the champion, the confidant, and the caretaker. At the beginning of the day, you're a hero for fixing a Kahoot crisis, but by lunch time, you're sorting through emails of frustration about the district's new LMS. Your day is a wild roller coaster ride of highs and lows, of twists and curves and near misses. Many of you were classroom teachers before stepping into this role, and you experience the same cycles of frustration and pride that you did in your own classrooms.

With the availability of easily accessible attack tools, everyone is at risk - including school districts. New vulnerabilities and exploits are discovered on a daily basis. Incidents are on the rise and a substantial percentage of cybersecurity incidents involving schools are due to the actions of school staff and/or students of those schools - sometimes resulting in criminal charges.