NSW DET kickstarts netbook deployment, seeks IT staff
- 27 August, 2009 14:55
- Comments 3
After a lengthy wait NSW high school students are receiving the netbooks promised to them by the state’s Department of Education (DET).
The NSW Digital Education Revolution tender opened in December, seeking a supplier to provision 200,000 netbooks to 571 schools for year 9-12 students over the next four years. The device had to be under $500, weigh less than 1.75kg, be smaller than an A4 sheet of paper, have a minimum screen size of 8.9-inches and be able to boot up in less than five seconds.
Despite IDC PC analyst, Felipe Rego, expressing doubt that a single supplier would be able to offer a device to meet those specific requirements before the January 14 deadline, six companies were shortlisted and Lenovo secured the $110 million contract with its IdeaPad S10e laptop in April. Microsoft was selected as a software partner, where it will serve up the Windows 7 operating system and Office suite.
Year 9 students are the first recipients in the netbook rollout and the Deputy Prime Minister, Julia Gillard, and NSW Education Minister, Verity Firth, will visit Fairvale High School in Sydney to grasp how the devices will be used in class.
In a release, Minister Firth also said the DET is taking on 400 additional IT support officers to provide on-site assistance to students and teachers. The Department is seeking people with excellent IT and communication skills for full-time temporary positions for the next four years. Three hundred places have already been filled.
The second phase of the recruitment process will commence early next month, which will include part-time IT support officer vacancies. According to a statement by a NSW DET spokesperson, applicants need to satisfy the following criteria:
- Successful completion of a computer studies program to year 12 or demonstrated experience in computer use and understanding
- Demonstrated problem solving skills and ability to provide effective computer support
- Sound communication and administrative skills
- Good organisational skills and ability to determine work priorities
- Ability to learn and use a variety of computer application systems
Early this month, ARN revealed the while NSW school PCs employ the McAfee SmartFilter XL with TrustedSource Web Database as an Internet filter, netbooks will use a licensed Blue Coat Systems clean-feed solution which is managed solely by the NSW DET.
The December tender also had a $70 million wireless connectivity component, which was won by IBM. The vendor will implement a centrally managed network over the next year.
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Comments
Kawaii Kitsune
Woohoo
Yay. How fun o(>w<)o
saxon
Is the DET really trying to be anoying?
The laptops are good but they are too restricted, can play games on them, (but if you do you end up with no battery)but playing games is not what they are for.... you cant even change the time that you want the computer to do an automatic scan for viruses, they have set the scan for 2:00 AM and if you try to change it, it says access denied!! now I dont know if its just me, but I definatly dont have my laptop running at 2:00 IN THE FUCKING MORNING!!! Another peoblem being the web site filter, it would be ALOT easyer if you peoplz in your big fancy smancy control room up their in sydney would turn it off (some how/if possibal) after school hours. and with the whole downloading thing, we should be able to atleast UPDATE THE FREAKING PROGRAMS. i.e. MSN, Microsof Forefront and Itunes otherwise in two years your just gonna have a whole heep of computers that dont work from viruses being transfered via USB from students downloading movies, games and other media at home and puting it on their laptops, the viruses are only gonna get smarter and and our virus protection still gonna be back in the 1st grade. Believe it or not there are some good things about the laptops like Office "One Note"and....ummmmmmmm....Itunes...yeppp thats just about all thats good about them, oh yea!. MSN, what a shame they put ther version before the update that you have to DOWNLOAD on it!! seriously, puting MSN on a 200,000 laptops then handing them out to 15 year old kids who spen a few hour a night on MSN is like the richest man in the world telling his son that he gonna buy him his first car and his first car is gonna be a farrari enzo then buying him a volvo!!! or even worse a Taxi!!! or even worse!!.... a CAMMERY!!!!!!!!!!!!
Anonymous
seems that folks don't get the idea - these aren't personal "do whatever you want" laptops... they are tools to be used in class to assist learning...
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