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FDM sees success with first in-depth report

This screenshot from Google Analytics for fastdrawmedia.com shows the visitors trend since statistics were first kept on the site. It shows three of the four highest traffic days were after the in-depth report was published and distributed.

Fast Draw Media (FDM) has experienced some success since the first in-depth report was finalized on the site on May 30.

Distributing through various social media channels, the story gained the attention of a major arthritis advocacy organization on Twitter as it was retweeted by the Arthritis Foundation. The story also gained exposure through a retweet by a supplement company marketing products to arthritis patients.

These tweets show how the distribution of this story progressed.

The story has attracted the most page views on the site since a record of site visits was first analyzed in February. Three of the four days of highest site traffic have occurred since May 30.

Overall, since the story was published, 70 visits have been made to the site, 50 of them new, according to Google Analytics. Over 68.5 percent of the visitors have been new. During the period from May 30 until June 17, there have been 147 page views with visitors viewing 2.10 pages per visit.

This screenshot from Google Analytics for fastdrawmedia.com shows the visitors trend since the in-depth report was first published.

Dallas, Texas ranks number one for location of visitors followed by Atlanta, GA; Mount Vernon, Texas; Quinlan, Texas and Denton, Texas. Since FDM serves the northeast Texas region and four of the top five cities for page visits are in the region, it appears FDM is reaching the area. Atlanta, GA is where the offices for the Arthritis Foundation are located; meaning a target audience for this story was reached in that regard.

FDM will continue to provide quality reports for the region on a variety of topics as it has done in the past. Readers are encouraged to interact in the comments section or via Twitter or Facebook.

Posted on June 17, 2012 by Gregory Rowe, Comments off

Posted on May 24, 2012 by Gregory Rowe, Comments off

Google™ Apps: Are they right for your enterprise?

Update: Following publication of this story, Tom Mills, Global Director of Enterprise Edu for Google, responded to Fast Draw Media’s inquiry into the Google Apps product. The following is his response.

“We give Google Apps for Education to schools and districts for free because we believe in the importance of education and the benefits of incorporating technology into that education. I’m continuously amazed by how teachers and students are using Google Apps in new, innovative ways to enhance learning.

“Google Apps for Education fosters real-time collaboration in and out of the classroom – a student at home can write an essay in a Google Doc and share it with her classmates for peer editing; teachers can set up a Google group for their class to send students updates about lesson plans and assignments. There’s no limit to how these tools can be used to promote learning, and we love hearing examples from the more than 16 million faculty, staff, and students using Google Apps for Education worldwide.”

For more information, visit Google Apps for Education website.

File sharing, online collaboration and cloud computing are terms heard or read about almost daily as various electronic tools permeate the workplace. While emailing a file might be a way to get it to your coworker or client, what happens when the receiver doesn’t have the correct program or version to open the file?

Additionally, in this era of budget-conscious businesses and government organizations, companies and agencies are looking for ways in which to limit as much overhead and labor costs as possible.

Quinlan Independent School District (QISD) in Quinlan, Texas, began a transition to using Google Apps two years ago by first migrating to Gmail™. The district has continued to add Google products made available to faculty and staff since then, allowing for expanded collaboration among teachers and students and allowed for a more versatile work environment for staff by giving them access to materials wherever they have an Internet connection, including mobile devices.

Mike Roberts, QISD Director of Technology, said the district initially looked at Gmail for the cost savings it provided the district over running its own email server and Google Apps was something that has been added on for the additional benefits it has offered the district.

He said the migration has saved the district money on a variety of fronts.

“Before we had always run our own email server,” he said, “but every few years, you have to look at upgrading.”

He said the cost savings to the district in terms of hardware and software upgrades, user licenses and labor costs have been significant for the district, but he did not have an exact dollar figure available. He added the labor costs and the overall hassle of running an email server has been greatly relieved.

“One benefit has been, with Google, we have redundancy of server space, whereas before we had one point of failure because we had only one server,” he said. “Google has multiple servers in multiple locations and, unless we have a fiber (optic wire) cut, we have access, not just here, but anywhere we are.”

Roberts said initially there was some hesitancy and resistance on the part of the staff with the change, but that the staff and students have adapted pretty well. The district has recently purchased Google Chromebooks ™ with grant money and the science and English departments at the middle and high schools are using them in a pilot program.

Besides cost savings and ease of access, Google Apps makes it easier to collaborate through sharing resources and even mimicking other well-known and often-used software products in an online environment, further reducing the cost of software licensing for businesses, charities and other users.

Google has a variety of products that can be easily integrated into a business of almost any size. The Google name has almost become synonymous with the Internet itself with many people using the company name as a verb meaning to do a web search.

If you are an entity looking for a low-cost IT solution, Google probably has a plan that will fit your budget. Check them out and see if they have a solution that’s right for you.

Posted on April 4, 2012 by Gregory Rowe, Comments off

Schools work to keep student information private

When it comes to reporting education news, student privacy concerns should remain upmost in the reporter’s mind. In most states, as well as at the federal level, laws are in place to protect the privacy of student information, both about their educational needs and also regarding their discipline.

The major federal law regarding the privacy of student information is the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA). This law limits access to a student’s information to school officials for school related purposes, to the student’s parents or legal guardians until the student turns 18 and to the student individually after age 18. According to information found on the U.S. Department of Education website, “Parents and students put their trust in the stewards of education data to ensure students’ personal information is properly safeguarded and is used only for legitimate purposes and only when absolutely necessary. The Department deeply values this trust and strives to ensure it is doing all it can do to protect the privacy of our students as the uses of their data to improve education increase.” The law seeks to provide these protections to American students and their families and applies to all areas of education: public or private; primary, secondary and post-secondary (colleges and universities).

In Texas, Government Code § 552.114 governs the privacy of student records. Chapter 552 of the Government Code is actually related to open records in the state, but student educational records are one exception to the open record requirements, basically eliminating the possibility of a reporter making a request under the Texas Open Records Act or the Freedom of Information Act.

“The reason for these privacy issues is we don’t want to give out any information of an address where someone may live,” said Juan Solis, PRIDE Academy Principal and Bullying and Peer Mediation Coordinator at Quinlan ISD and an education doctoral student. “We don’t know what other people’s ideas may be, what their thought process is or what may lead to a very, very traumatic incident. We don’t want to be responsible because we were the ones that gave out an address where an angry parent went to confront someone and something bad ended up happening.”

Solis said this is the reason Quinlan ISD policy is that information about a student is not given to anyone not on the student’s contact list, unless it has been requested by a law enforcement or child protective agency.

He also stated that most districts have policies in place that allow parents and guardians to opt-out of having student information, like honors and awards, and images submitted to the media, even to have those images and information barred from the district’s own website.

Solis said the severity of consequences for educators who violate student privacy protections is largely based on the nature of the breach and how severe an action parents take. He said they could range from a simple reprimand up to an educator having a teaching license revoked.

The basic thing, Solis said, is for educators at all levels, to remain professional in the interactions with students and parents and in the handling of student information.

“The advice that has been given to us by our professors and other professionals is, ‘If you think it could make headline news, you probably don’t need to do it.’”

Posted on March 6, 2012 by Gregory Rowe, Comments off

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