Scotia-Glenville IT plans student help desks, moves from PowerSchool to SchoolTool and tightens cybersecurity

Megan Johnson, speaking for the district IT team, gave the board an overview of current and planned technology initiatives intended to improve classroom services, security and user support across the Scotia-Glenville Central School District.

Johnson said the district will launch student-run help desks at both the middle school and high school next week to provide device repair, loaner Chromebooks and basic technical support. "We're going to be launching our 1st student help desk at both the middle school and the high school," she said, and described training that will allow students to perform Chromebook repairs, website and app projects and 3-D printing tasks (Megan Johnson, IT department representative).

The district will replace PowerSchool with a new student information system, SchoolTool, next year after a committee vetted multiple platforms. Johnson said a district SIS is required by New York State to report enrollment, demographics and attendance, and SchoolTool was chosen in part because it already supports New York State reporting requirements.

On cybersecurity, Johnson outlined several steps the district is implementing: single sign-on and role-based permissions for applications; monthly resets of guest Wi-Fi; plans to deploy multi-factor authentication in fall 2025; server backups and a new Wi-Fi encryption program that will segment staff and student network access. She said the PowerSchool corporate-level breach that made news was not something the district could have prevented locally because it happened through PowerSchool's backend.

Johnson described ClassLink data anonymization for vendor data transfers, a new centralized print-management system (PaperCut) that will withhold print jobs until the user releases them at the device, and a rollout of new copiers and printers with secure print queues expected in February or March. She said this system will reduce the visibility of others' print jobs and help protect sensitive documents such as individualized education plans.

Chromebook management was addressed: district students in grades 2'through 12 have assigned Chromebooks tied to inventory; K'1 students borrow devices from carts and the district has requested additional Chromebooks through the Smart Schools application. Johnson said the district follows a replacement cycle of roughly every three years for devices, though machines can run longer if needed. She also described an automated onboarding workflow that issues accounts and necessary applications to new students and staff within 24 hours of activation.

Johnson said the IT department is also exploring how to credential students through free vendor certifications (for example, Google certificates) as part of the student help-desk program.

Board members and community members asked follow-up questions about ParentSquare/StudentSquare access for grandparents and community members, the technical details of the encryption and print queue protections, Chromebook wipe procedures, and the cadence for device replacement; Johnson answered that ParentSquare has a community component that can be enabled, that devices are wiped by IT before reissue, and that print jobs will generally not be visible to other users before release at the device.

Johnson credited cross-departmental support from buildings and grounds, transportation and the business office, and said the district's IT work is intended to improve classroom technology while strengthening data security.