Sunday, September 19, 2010

Re: Google Apps in Schools

How do you train your developer(s), and what are the contingency plans if
your main developer gets hit by a bus? My goal has been to move all of our
systems to commercial hosted solutions and get rid of all of the homegrown
(and labor intensive) tweaks that grew up over the years. Most schools jus=
t
have a really hard time spending money in order to keep their developers
up-to-date and I've seen the results when the person who developed a system
leaves. Maybe I'm missing something.
--=20
Derrel Fincher
Director of Information and Communication Technology
Graded - The American School of S=C3=A3o Paulo
http://www.graded.br | (55 11) 3747-4800 x160


On Thu, Sep 16, 2010 at 11:38 AM, Joe Frost
<Joe.Frost@phoenixchristian.org>wrote:

> ZOHO is different, their api is on our site, we shell out only to their
> applications. All student data, when they click on save, gets
> immediately uploaded to our school site.
>
> We've implemented SSL, we've disabled auto-signup so there are no drive
> by accounts, it's invitation only and locked down, so all the data
> remains private.
>
> For our money invested, it was well worth it.
>
> For the safety of our students and their data - priceless :)
>
> Thanks,
> *******
>
> Joe Frost, MS CIS
> Director of Technology & Operations
> Department Chair Technology
> http://www.phoenixchristian.org
>
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Jason Johnson [mailto:jasonpj@yahoo.com]
> Sent: Thursday, September 16, 2010 6:27 AM
> To: ISED-L@LISTSERV.SYR.EDU
> Subject: Re: Google Apps in Schools
>
> I found this discussion very interesting because there is a bias
> expressed against Google when their systems appear to have worked. The
> person was identified and terminated. If anything this makes me trust
> them more. Put this in stark contrast to FaceBook, who despite their
> public professions have a CEO who has admitted (in writing) to accessing
> data in the same way
> (http://www.boingboing.net/2010/09/14/damning-zuckerberg-i.html).
>
> There are very few systems that make your data unreachable to internal
> staff and very few companies that could not modify their terms of
> service to do whatever they want with your data. Especially cloud based
> services. To get that level of security requires an investment beyond
> the reach and need of most schools.
> You bring up Zoho as being different from Google but it has all the same
> issues, though as a paid service you have a stronger legal foot to stand
> on in disputes. From the Zoho terms of service:
>
> "We assure you that the contents of your user account will not be
> disclosed to anyone and will not be accessible even to employees of Zoho
> except in circumstances specifically mentioned in this Privacy Policy
> Statement."
>
> That means someone has access to all of your data via Zoho (even if you
> are using local storage and their API). It is likely multiple people,
> in multiple countries (Just like google), and even if you deleted it now
> it would remain in their possession, likely for weeks or months.
>
> This is not to diminish Zoho, Google, or any other cloud service. I
> think they
> offer much better security and privacy than most schools can offer
> internally or even with the help of custom development and consulting,
> but every system is vulnerable and they are most vulnerable to those who
> administer them.
>
> _J
> ____________________________
> Jason at jasonpj@yahoo.com
>
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