From the category archives: Conference Notes
Conference Notes
Questeq had the opportunity to co-sponsor a BYOD event with Enterasys and HP at Heinz Field last week. The event, held on 1/24/13, focused on the challenges, considerations and benefits of implementing a BYOD environment into K-12 teaching and learning. Our CEO, Jeff Main, as well as Jonathan Kidwell, Director of K-12 North America for Enterasys, gave presentations on current K-12 BYOD and Mobility trends. In addition to these presentations, networking opportunities and demos, each attendee had the opportunity to tour the stadium and Steelers locker room.
Nearly 50 school leaders from Pennsylvania and Ohio were able to participate in this unique event. Many valuable conversations were started among the attendees and our team members that we hope will continue for many weeks to come.
If are considering implementing BYOD in your district, please visit the following page for a compilation of useful resources.
http://www.questeq.com/Assessments/byodconsiderations.aspx
Click the photo below to view our event photos on Facebook.
Questeq recently attended the OSBA Conference that was held this year in Columbus, Ohio. Many school board leaders and administrators from Ohio attended the three-day meeting from November 11th-13th 2012. The Questeq team had fantastic conversations with school districts from all over Ohio.
OSBA highlights included the Student Achievement Fair, boasting 100 booths displaying innovative student programs, as well as top student entertainment groups from each of OSBA’s five regions; the Trade Show, offering more than 700 exhibits of the latest in education-related goods and services; and countless opportunities to share ideas with school leaders from across Ohio.
This is our first year attending the OSBA event to promote Questeq services. We had a fantastic two days and our waterproof cell phone case giveaway was a huge hit. All of our material was completely distributed by the middle of day two. Eugene Sciulli, National Sales Director, worked hard all week engaging Ohio school board members and showing our passion for helping school districts.
With over 100 schools completing our technology needs survey and great conversations with board members, Questeq should have its first Ohio school district customer in the very near future!
Questeq recently attended the PSBA conference that was held this year in Hershey, PA. Many school board leaders and administrators from Pennsylvania attended the three-day meeting from October 16th – 19th 2012. The Questeq team had fantastic conversations with school districts from all over Pennsylvania. Our brand new display booth, giveaway and survey process was a huge success this year.
Questeq has attended the PSBA event for almost 20 years. This year seemed to be different as district after district showed up at our booth to discuss our outsourced technology management model. The common issue faced by every district we talked with is centered on reduced budgets, increased competition for students and an unclear vision of the future classroom and teaching model. Additionally we found the growing disconnects between the curriculum and technology departments are limiting the radical changes required to transform our public schools. The rising costs of health insurance and benefits like PSERS have board members and superintendents scrambling to find a solution to the skyrocketing costs of technology employees.
It feels like the education vertical is finally accepting and embracing the privatization of technology management in K12. Hopefully Questeq will experience the same success in Columbus, OH at the OSBA show November 11th-14th!
Questeq is currently investing significant financial and engineering resources to design the next generation delivery model that supports BYOD and anytime anywhere learning in K12.
Questeq recently attended the Enterasys SuperDrive 2012 partner conference that was held in Las Vegas, NV. During the two day conference Questeq learned about the exciting new solutions from Enterasys that support BYOD and network management in K12. Enterasys’ Mobile IAM product, which will be available in either a hardware appliance or for virtualized environments that run VMware’s ESX server, will offer identity, access and inventory management, context-based policy enforcement that includes more than 45 attributes, management capabilities through a single console, and automated auditing and reporting.
The goal is to provide Technology Management companies like Questeq a single offering that addresses all the elements of BYOD, from the devices that are accessing the district networks and the applications that are running on those devices to the students themselves and their locations. The issue of students and staff using their personal devices—including smartphones and tablets—is a concern for Questeq, who need to worry about the security of our districts network and data.
Both wired and wireless connectivity represent important components to our new delivery model design and we continue to standardize throughout our K12 customer base with Enterasys solutions. Additionally Questeq was featured as one the top reference partners at the event, please view the attached Questeq partner video filmed and presented at the Las Vegas event.