There is no box

thinking out loud about technology, education and life

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K-12 Superintendent, reformed IT guy, educator, 1:1 evangelist, life long learner, father, husband, geek, ex self-propelled field artillery turret mechanic, GCT, CCTO, INFP

Category: Commentary

  • People Read This Thing?

    I usually write on topics that are under my skin at the present moment. Sometimes I lose interest or get sidetracked in the middle of a post and it never makes it to Publish. And sometimes the story just hasn’t fully developed yet in real life (reference the VDI Saga which is languishing at part 4). Through it all…

  • Space, The Final Frontier (But Why Is There A Chromebook Here?)

    If you didn’t already know, I co-host two podcast in my free time. In the latest episode of rebootED, Dr. Mike Vollmert and I talk about the effect spaces can have on culture and then we talk about the Milpitas Unified School District’s push into the future with Chromebooks and Google Apps.  

  • The Culture Of Spaces

    The Executive Briefing Center. A magical place where customers go to become enamored with products or ecosystems or solutions. Cisco, Brocade, Apple, Google and Microsoft. I’ve been to several of these corporate spaces and I’m struck by the differences of each. Cisco’s was over the top impressive. Like visiting OZ. But look behind the curtain…

  • In A Perfect EdTech World…

    In a perfect EdTech world, I would give every teacher an ultrabook running Ubermix, an iPad with AppleTV and a Projector or other Large Format Display (LFD) device. Perhaps even two. This would be the basic “Technology Package”. I’d wrap it around Google Apps for Education and the web. Then I’d throw in a classroom…

  • True HTML5 RDP Direct For Chrome, OMG!

    It’s finally happened! Someone (2x specifically) has made a true HTML5 RDP client for Chrome. No public gateways, no server side clients. Just an RDP client in the browser. I think I am in heaven. Now I really can use a Chromebook and get some Windows Admin work done too. Check it out – http://www.2x.com/rdp-client/chrome/?c=1

  • The Future Of EdTech Is Free (Mostly) #cue13 #schwab4CUE

    Think Differently About Your IT Spending:    

  • Schwab Who?

    So today a staff member at one of the schools in my district told me that she didn’t understand what all these Financial emails were that she was receiving from Charles Schwab. Turns out she thought my IT status updates were marketing for brokerage services. Now that we’ve met face to face, she’s not deleting…

  • Caught Between Two Worlds – The Rogue Education Technology Wave Is Coming

    Things used to be simple. I architected networks, administered servers and made sure email flowed uninterrupted. I was an IT guy and I was pretty good at it. Then one day I became a classroom teacher and my simple life in IT, focused on up time and putting six computers in the back of every…

  • The Power Of The Internet – Hanging Out With Yong Zhao

    Today I was in a Google Hangout on Air with Dr. Yong Zhao. Dr. Zhao is author of several books about education including his latest, “World Class Learners: Educating Creative and Entrepreneurial Students” and has keynoted all over the world. I saw his keynote at ISTE12 and was totally amazed. Today the power of the Internet…

  • VDI Sprawl

    This is part 4 in a series of posts on my not so great experience inheriting a VDI infrastructure at a school district. We left off with the student virtual desktops running on repurposed non-redundant, redundant hardware at the secondary site and teachers and staff running on the DO hardware. Through the first few months of school, teacher and staff performance…