Thank you!

danny33c
New Contributor III

I would like to thank @cdenesha for organizing this session! It was some of the best time spent at JNUC 2016. The only problem was that it was way too short. I think this breakfast session could have easily gone through lunch and dinner and still wouldn't have been enough time. We are a district that uses PC desktops, iPads, but unfortunately no Macs yet. JNUC is definitely centered around Macs, I knew that going in, but hopefully in the future there are more sessions (round tables) around K12 iPad programs. Hopefully we can keep this discussion open, and there is a "K12-Education" tag in jamf nation that we can utilize.

Thanks again,
Dan

4 REPLIES 4

blackholemac
Valued Contributor III

I'll second this. I wish we honestly had a 4th day on the conference...three for general sessions and one for folks to take in mini-events or other activities. As for Mac/iPad mix, I found it was a good mix actually at the conference level, maybe not the K-12 event level. I found that everything I learned about Apple School Manager very helpful. I will note at the K-12 session that it might have been fun to swap war stories on getting 50 new apps keyed in for start of school and hear how others manage to keep on top of app requests. I would have also liked a good session on some common apps and how to get "Managed App Config" populated for a lot of apps to keep my users from having to.

I remember talking to you personally and remember that Infinite Campus just got officially supported and will admit I'm jealous. I wish PowerSchool would be magically. @danny33c If you or anyone else ever need a sounding board to run things by, feel free to look me up on here and I will do the same for you. Sometimes having a sounding board is the best help anyone can give me. After all, someone has to be the one to either second a great idea or tell me I'm full of it when I come up with a bad one.

I still have lots to learn, specifically around the ability to empower other users and occasionally get hard tech tips as well.

Take care

cdenesha
Valued Contributor III

It was indeed too short, and we didn't get much chance to mingle and discuss.

I want to thank @treybach for seeing my panic and taking over the Facilitating and trying to keep us on time!

I have two suggestions for next year:

1) have it on Tuesday if possible. Then you can have time at the gatherings/parties to connect and chat!

2) wear something that clearly identifies you as an iOS admin. For some of us making that initial connection is Hard. It would be easier if we knew up front we had that in common. Hmm.. please vote up this FR: Change JNUC badges; iOS/Mac, Commercial/Education.

Let's definitely post more with the K-12 tag as Dan suggested!

chris

cdenesha
Valued Contributor III

Remember too to Subscribe to that K-12 Education tag so you'll get an email whenever it is used!

blackholemac
Valued Contributor III

@cdenesha thank you for putting forth the effort coordinate this session. If it makes you feel any better about clamming up I'm right there with you... I could not have done it well myself and was just glad someone did. I have a hard time leading user training sessions in my own district and these are people who I see daily.

I also have no formal background in the teaching and learning side, nor any formal university degree in IT in anything computer-related so I always feel out of place in such sessions.

That being said I have 14 years of strong field experience on Apple and love forums where I get to share!

As to the badges that is a hard one. I'll harken back to my experience again. When I started out I was the Mac field technician in a primarily Windows district. I picked up the "Mac Systems Admin" position by inheriting it when our old Mac guy left 8-9 years ago. We only had about 150 Macs. Over 2 years, we added over 4,000 iPads...my primary focus became iPads, in my position got renamed to be "Apple Systems Admin" for lack of a better term. My heart still lives on the Mac side and managing it, but my primary duty is iOS. As such I hate to pigeonhole myself one way or the other. My favorite work is helping our now 400+ Mac users on a one by one basis, but primary job is to be level 2/3 support for ALL of our Apple product users.

I also don't know if a commercial vs EDU label is right because my best ideas for us come from both worlds. I tend to follow @Chris_Hafner a lot on the EDU side. I've been following @cdenesha a lot lately too.

I equally like hearing from the commercial/government side too especially in terms of hard tech scaling.

What I would really like to see on the badges is our JamfNation handle added maybe with a QR code added that would take someone to a profile page about the attendee, his or her Apple-related interests and what they are seeking to learn.

As to scheduling, i'm of the opinion that we can't win... Tuesday night was a trip to the code 42 party ( always a good time ), and an excellent night session put on by the local jamfnation user group in Minneapolis- Saint Paul . Hearing from Paul Bowden at Microsoft what is absolutely helpful to our patch management strategy. I almost wish they would hold the big party on Thursday, but then everyone has a plane to catch. Despite all of that I wish our k-12 session could've been a lot longer.

My two cents on the topic.