For school districts across the U.S., it’s the beginning of a new year.  With each new school year, it is common for new technology-based systems to be introduced into classrooms. This means a lot of learning and adjusting in those first few weeks.  How do you, as a security administrator or technology department, help teachers and staff members get off to a good start with computer security?  It may seem tricky as time and attention are limited — employees are already getting a “fire hose” of new information. Don’t worry, we’ve got you covered!

It’s best to start by reminding teachers where to save their files on your school’s network. If their document drive isn’t already pointed to their network drive and they have to explicitly choose where to save something, show them how to save to their workspace on the network or cloud server. This is a great habit to get into at the beginning of the year. This is so that teachers and staff members are more likely to stay consistent with it, but also because backing up files is the foremost step anyone should take to prevent the loss of important data.

Here are a few benefits you should mention to help teachers and staff understand the importance of this habit:

• Work saved in the cloud / on the network is automatically backed up each day.
• We can restore your files in the event of a virus or computer failure.
• If your computer gets lost or stolen, we can provide a new one with all of your files.
• The next time we upgrade your computer, the process will be much faster!

Some ideas for instructing teachers and staff in this process:

• Create a quick video showing how to save files to the network/cloud and post it on your website.
• Provide a quick half-page/one-page guide complete with screenshots.

It’s important to provide all of this information in a format that is readily available whenever a user needs it.  Remember the “fire hose” of information? This can leave teachers and staff feeling pretty overwhelmed. You can make things easier on them (and ultimately you) by ensuring that they know how to get their hands on a guide when they need it.

For best results, here are a few tips on how to deliver the information:

• Include the how-to in your staff newsletter.
• Send an e-mail with the guide (if written) or link to the video.
• Post the guide in the teachers’ lounge and staff break rooms.
• Have the guide distributed by instructional technology during training sessions.

When sending out information, you may have to do it several times or in different formats to ensure that no one misses it. If you really want to get noticed, you can deliver printouts with a bit of candy attached to each teacher’s mailbox.  (We realize that this may not be conducive with a green policy to reduce print usage.)

There is a wealth of information to convey about computer security to users, but it is important to start small at the beginning of the year to keep from overwhelming anyone.  Learning where to save work is a great place to start as it directly benefits the user and opens the door to other topics of conversation (ransomware, drive-by infections, sensitive data, etc.)

Of course, this doesn’t just apply to school districts.  In any workplace, you can provide guidance on where to save work files to new employees as they come on-board.

We wish our school district clients all the best as they begin a new school year.