Google Goes To School

Going berserk on how to submit homework while fighting with flu… Stop worrying because schools and colleges are embracing Google Apps, the world’s largest & the most secure cloud computing service. Henceforth students, teachers & the school personnel will be interacting in a collaborative environment offering extreme mobility. Now we can share documents, chat, schedule assignments and even share video assignments all under one roof of our good old browser.

We did a quick survey and all the Google App users announced the below in unison:
a. It saves time, energizes the students and thus boosting performance. Let’s rephrase this as a “Digital Adrenaline Rush”
b. Helping students to explore and troubleshoot the ever changing E-world
and …
c. We can think of building a bigger lab now, Google Apps saves a premium.

What teachers are saying?
“Google Apps is mounting students’ engagement and thus saving our time”.
Shifting to a web-based platform has made distributing, sharing, and collecting material seamless and has significantly decreased workload of teachers, as they do not have to create several different versions. Students’ behavior has improved, attendance is higher, and suspension levels have fallen.
An educator says “Our students are increasing their reading ability at faster rates than anything we’ve seen before”.

Are students happy?
High school sophomore Kylie shares, "we no longer have to exchange contact information because everyone already has a Google account and it is saved in our contacts. Creating either a Google doc or group for the project, and inviting teachers to look at our work is just a matter of few split seconds." Others find that editing together in Google Docs "improved our writing by sharing with others and making comments at the same time"
And 5th standard student Sonia likes Google Apps for the practical reason that "you don’t have to worry about paper getting lost and having your things get torn or ripped."

Explore, troubleshoot and respond to the ever changing E-world

‘Survival of the fittest’ policy is very much pertinent for us.  Google Apps will make us fit if not fittest, to match up with the ever changing world with its obvious benefits of collaboration and fluency with technology. For instance, you, a student of Engineering keeping a running e-portfolio of the classroom projects with Google Sites. The digital accumulation of your college efforts will likely mean more to future employers than the mere bullet points on your resume.

Let us show you another example: A teacher is using Google Spreadsheets to free the science classroom from the confines of the textbook. Students conduct actual experiments and code the data in collaborative online tables. In this instance, students get their hands dirty, literally, by measuring plant growth in various soil types, and analyzing the data using digital tools, just as a real scientist would. 

Isn’t it an engaging way to help our Department of Education meet its goal of increasing scientific competitiveness, as outlined in the ambitious “Race to the Top” agenda?

Saving Money
We can kill two birds with one shot. Educational reformation + Cost reduction = Google Apps. The Google Apps services are apparently very attractive. After a survey we have found numerous schools and colleges using Google Apps saves millions of $ per year.
Sighting few examples: 1) The Oregon Department of Education estimates a savings of $1.5 million per year.

2) Vickram College of Engineering in India by using Google Apps is saving an impressive amount annually.

3) Even the relatively humble Maine Township District 207 in Illinois, another school system estimates their savings to be around $160,000 each year.
  

Now we can always think upon upgrading our schools’ infrastructure, because ‘Google saves a premium’. For example: A desire to have a technologically well equipped lab or a play station.
10 GB storage per account with good uptime guarantees and no longer having to deal with the spam policing will help IT administrators of the school to take a deep breath and relax. The free, Educational Edition is really useful, too, which offers Email, calendar, messaging, phone and video calls from a single interface.

Expert comments:
For Steve Nelson, Technology of Director of Oregon Virtual Schools, these savings allow the state to provide multimedia streaming services that support student-generated content, which he says was “not economically feasible” without Google.

Henry Thiele, IT director for District 207 says he is “surprised by how many schools don’t even know that [Google apps] is there.” And, when they hear about the opportunity, says, Thiele, they’re curious to know “what the catch is.” Thiele just responds, “There is no catch.”

Benefits in a nutshell

• Create personal email id with institute’s domain name (like petter@kingschools.co.uk, hannah@iimb.edu or manoj@woodstockschool.in)
• Collaborate documents using Google docs (sharing project works, etc)
• Use calendar to schedule their weekly exams
• Also create own sites using Google Sites (teachers can effectively use this system to communicate to students)

If students are happy, 100% endeavor they will give effortlessly on their studies. As a result teachers will be pleased. And trust us ‘Students performing well’ is the success mantra of every school’s escalation.

When we attended Google's one-day summit with numerous schools and colleges; their faculties and tech-coordinators, we heard about the myriad struggles faced by schools and colleges trying to implement Apps for Education.

You can always approach us concerning deployment or implementation queries and we assure you to solve your problems. We are Global Authorised Google Apps Reseller and help you in express setting up and configuration of Google Apps coupled with excellent support including data migration, provide user training and best practices, tackle systems integration, and develop custom application extensions.