Friday, August 3, 2007

School technology is my favorite thing...

Whatever. When the printers don't work, when the Mailwasher won't open (whatever the hell a Mailwasher is), when your old, obsolete computer is the only one working, just think of a few of your favorite things...

If I were a computer tech person (in some alternate universe), I would be so incredibly ashamed if all of the teachers in one of my schools came back to start school for the new year, and the computers would not work for them! At my school, we have become so used to tech problems that they seem more common than for the computers to work well. After all, the tech people have ALL SUMMER to prepare for us. Why doesn't everything work? Why are teachers going home to print out their syllabi using their own ink so their evil-eyed administrators will be appeased the next day? Why are all the passwords on the student computers suddenly changed YET AGAIN, and no one has been told? Why are teachers new to the system unable to get their laptops for DAYS after their arrival? Why are the grading and attendance programs different EVERY YEAR, so that teachers begin the year without access to their rolls?

Because. That's why.

I remember those dandy mimeograph machines we used to use. Yep, those were the days. A teacher might go home with violet fingertips, but the sheets had that SMELL when they were freshly run off, and you could stand there and watch the machine run hypnotically around and around and around, making the copies for your students...no passwords, no arrogant tech people talking down to everyone else, no "access denied" messages. Just that lovely toxic purple ink...