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Category: Tech Support

Looking Back at 2020

Posted on by San Mateo County Community College District

In this extraordinary year, The San Mateo County Community College District has innovated and pivoted to continue serving our students. Faculty and staff set up their home offices, reached out to students, and adapted courses to online format. Students, once again, showed their resolve and resilience in moving to online education.

Our students were already facing significant challenges in terms of housing, transportation, access to food, financial security, and equity in the classroom. The pandemic has only intensified those challenges. In response, the District adapted some student basic needs supports and launched several new ones:

San Mateo County Community College District Emergency Food Distribution
The District partnered with Second Harvest of Silicon Valley to launch a Friday food distribution program at CSM. The program quickly reached its maximum capacity of serving 1,000 families per week. To date the program has distributed 1.2 million pounds of food, worth more than $2 million, to more than 27,000 families.

In September, Skyline College added a food distribution program on Wednesdays. To date the program has distributed 300,000 pounds of food, worth $537,000, to 7,500 families.

Emergency Food Card Program
Before the pandemic struck, the District had begun to distribute monthly vouchers for free groceries to students identified as having food insecurity challenges. With campuses closed, the vouchers are now distributed digitally. About 1,600 students have received more than $1 million in grocery vouchers to date. The District has funded another $1 million for the 2020-21 fiscal year.

Housing
The District allocated and distributed $100,000 in emergency funding to students for housing during the pandemic and set up a case management system to assist students with housing needs. The District SparkPoint Centers have also built a partnership with United Way Bay Area to provide rental assistance to students. About 30 students received housing vouchers this fall worth $1,750 each.

Chromebook and Hotspot Distribution
Without access to campus computers and wifi, many students were left without the technology they needed to continue their studies. The District acquired hundreds of Chromebooks and wifi hotspots to loan to students. This fall, about 400 Chromebooks are on loan to students, as well as 422 hotspots, and 128 calculators.

Drive-Up WiFi
Students can now make reservations online for a parking space in designated wifi parking lots. Students work from their cars, and campus restroom facilities are available.

Telemedicine
Using secure HIPAA-compliant Zoom technology, the College Health Centers now offer free telemedicine appointments to students. The telemedicine clinics offer medical advice, tuberculosis screenings, lab orders, some prescription refills, evaluation and treatment of illnesses and injuries, and referrals to other providers.

Flu Shot Clinics
The Health Centers have partnered with San Mateo County Health to offer free flu shots to employees and students. Each campus hosted a drive-through flu shot clinic in November or December.

Face-to-Face Instruction
With the community in need of healthcare workers, first responders, and job training/retraining programs, the District began piloting face-to-face instructional programs in the summer. While instructors have been able to convert most courses to a fully online format, not all instruction can take place remotely. Thanks to big support efforts from Facilities, ITS, and Public Safety, classes that must meet face-to-face are now doing so.

As of this fall, more than 700 students are participating in some form of on-campus instruction as part of their curriculum. A sampling of these courses includes:

Cañada College:
Medical Assisting
Radiology Technology

College of San Mateo:
Dentistry
EMT
Fire Academy
Nursing

Skyline College:
Automotive Technology
Cosmetology
Surgery Technology
Respiratory Care
STEM labs

We Salute Our Essential Workers

Posted on by San Mateo County Community College District

Throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, certain categories of professionals have been designated “essential workers” for their role in maintaining the health and safety of the community. While most of our classified staff, faculty, and administrators work from home, these employees still come to work to keep campuses, buildings and technology running smoothly to support the District’s educational mission. With three college campuses and the District Office to support, and with the complexities of intensive sanitization and safety procedures, these teams are more essential than ever.

Facilities
The District Facilities team continues to work full time during the pandemic. Every classroom, lab, hallway, staircase, door handle and elevator associated with a face-to-face class must be sanitized every day in order to keep people safe. Approximately 85 groundskeepers, engineers and custodians are onsite every day.  Three facilities managers and three custodial supervisors, and a project coordinator oversee these operations. 

Prior to the pandemic, the Facilities custodians had already been certified hospital-grade cleaning and disinfecting techniques by the Cleaning Management Institute. They have kept up to speed on Coronavirus sanitization techniques by participating in workshops through the Global Biorisk Advisory Council (GBAC). Teams also now use a specialized Clorox 360 electrostatic disinfecting machine.

The team also continues to maintain District physical assets, monitoring central boiler and chiller plants, monitoring critical life safety and building systems, and performing regular grounds keeping. 

Information Technology Services  
With most employees working remotely, and nearly all classes being taught online, technology is more important than ever. A team of 30 information technology professionals is on campus every day to support the District’s networks infrastructure, learning management systems, databases, business and records systems, communications systems, websites, and equipment. The team provides remote technical support for employees working from home, loans laptops and other equipment to employees and students, and has built the infrastructure to offer free Wi-Fi for students in the college parking lots.

Public Safety
The pandemic and its restrictions make safety, security, and controlling campus access of paramount importance. Access to the campuses and their buildings must be protected in order to offer food and technology distributions, face-to-face classes, and other high-priority campus operations. A team of 37 Public Safety employees makes this possible, working round-the-clock onsite at the three campuses.

Public Safety added six temporary employees to assist with staffing the campus access points, where people are screened for entry to the campuses. These employees work outside in summer heat, winter cold, rain and smoke, and have become experts at safely contacting and communicating with hundreds of people at our access points.

A grateful community member brought flowers to Officer Zorie Gomez, in appreciation of Officer Gomez’ cheerful and helpful disposition every week at the entrance of the District Emergency Food Distribution event.
A grateful community member brought flowers to Officer Zorie Gomez, in appreciation of Officer Gomez’ cheerful and helpful disposition every week at the entrance of the District Emergency Food Distribution event.

Public Safety has assigned several employees to assist with the facilitation of every food distribution event at Skyline and CSM since they began. Officers also assist with other campus operations like technology distributions and flu shot clinics.  

The Public Safety emergency manager and emergency management coordinator have taken a lead role in the startup and ongoing work of the District’s Emergency Operations Center.

Daman Grewal Becomes District Chief Technology Officer (CTO)

Posted on by San Mateo County Community College District

After a comprehensive search process and final approval from the Board of Trustees, Daman Grewal was named District Chief Technology Officer (CTO).  The Chancellor announced the appointment to District employees on November 2.

Grewal oversees the District’s Information Technology Services (ITS) office, which includes 30 staff working at the three colleges and the District Office. He and his team are responsible for providing students and employees with business technology, learning management systems, databases, communications systems, websites, phone, computers, and many other essential tools for supporting the District’s educational mission. 

“Daman is a well-experienced professional with exceptional knowledge, skills and abilities to lead teams, build consensus, and provide sound guidance and advice and to facilitate processes that engage stakeholders from across the District,” Chancellor Claire said in his announcement. “I am confident that he will continue to serve the District well in his role as our Chief Technology Officer.”

Prior to joining the District as a contract employee with Strata Information Group in 2019, Grewal held many senior IT roles in higher education, including as Chief Information Technology Officer at City College of San Francisco, Chief Information Officer at the Cal State Maritime Academy, Director of Technical Services at Ohlone Community College District, and an IT Services Manager at Stanford University.  He received a bachelor’s degree in Commerce from Delhi University (India) and an MBA from the University of Lincoln (England).

Free Drive-Up Wi-Fi Now Available for SMCCCD Students

Posted on by San Mateo County Community College District

The San Mateo County Community College District now offers free Wi-Fi access for students at all three campuses. The new “Drive-Up Wi-Fi” service allows students to park in a specially designated parking lot on the campus of their choice, where they can access Wi-Fi to attend online classes or do schoolwork.

The program was made possible by an all-District team of staff and administrators who have been working to design a system that provides convenient student Wi-Fi access while maintaining District health and safety requirements during the pandemic.

Reservations are required. Students can pick the campus most convenient to them, fill out the Eventbrite reservation form, print or download their Eventbrite ticket, and follow the instructions. Restrooms are available. Students have in/out privileges for the Drive-Up Wi-Fi lot between 6am – 8pm.

Drive-Up Wi-Fi Website/Reservations

Student Drive-Up Wi-Fi Hours
Cañada College:
Monday – Friday, 6 am – 8 pm

College of San Mateo:
Monday – Saturday (except Fridays), 6 am – 8 pm

Skyline College:
Monday – Friday (except Wednesdays), 6 am – 8 pm

Student Drive-Up Wi-Fi Rules

  • Review COVID-19 symptoms and stay home if you are sick 
  • Make a reservation on Eventbrite and bring your ticket to campus
  • Check in at the Public Safety Access Point
  • Drive to the Wi-Fi lot and park in any space with a GREEN cone
  • Only members of the same household in each vehicle
  • All vehicle occupants must remain in the vehicle except to use restrooms
  • Read and follow all rules on your Eventbrite ticket
  • Abide by the Student Code of Ethics

For more information, please see the District Drive-Up Wi-Fi website.  

Zoom Updates – May 22, 2020

Posted on by San Mateo County Community College District

Zoom has added even more security features and ability for meeting organizers to maintain control, in software client 5.0.  Please be sure to update to Zoom’s latest release to take advantage of these new features, and be prepared for transition to higher end encryption starting May 30. The 5.0 update includes:

Consent for unmute: When a meeting host has muted a participant, they can no longer unmute that person without their consent. That participant will now receive a prompt asking for consent to be unmuted. Note: With this feature, the option for hosts to Unmute All participants at once has been removed, but will return in a later release.

New audio for Waiting Rooms: We’ve created a specific audio chime for when someone hits the Waiting Room, so hosts are aware that they’re there. You can also enable the “Play sound when participants join or leave” feature to hear alerts when participants are coming and going.

Meeting information during screen share: Participants can now access meeting information, such as meeting ID, when sharing their screen. Find it under “More” in the meeting controls.

Multiple login restrictions: For meetings that require registration, hosts can choose whether to allow participants to join from multiple devices. This is available under Registration Options of the meeting details section in the web portal.

Return Your Technology or Other Borrowed Items!

Posted on by San Mateo County Community College District

All borrowed items including Chromebooks, laptops, hotspots, calculators, library books, textbooks, and other borrowed items are now due back to your campus. There are only two days left to return items.

Drop off items at your campus 
Please drop off your items at Cañada, CSM, or Skyline, on one of these dates:

  • Wednesday, May 27: 12:00 pm – 6:00 pm 
  • Thursday, May 28: 12:00 pm – 6:00 pm 

Drive through or walk-up drop off locations are marked on these campus maps: Cañada College, College of San Mateo, Skyline College. 

Which campus should I drop my items off at? 
Choose the campus drop off site according to these guidelines. 

  • Bookstore rentals must be returned to the campus from which they were rented. Have your G-number ready.
  • Library books or other items may be returned at any campus 
  • Technology items such as laptops, hotspots, or calculators may be returned at any campus

Please check your library account for a list of your current library or technology loans, and contact your campus library as needed with questions.

You will be required to follow these rules when dropping off, in order to protect the health and safety of you and our employees:

  • Wear a face covering
  • Stay 6 feet away from all other people
  • Do NOT come to campus if you are sick. 

You may park off campus and walk over to complete your returns. It is okay to have a friend or a family member drop off on your behalf.

Those who fail to follow these rules will be turned away, and need to coordinate with our team to find alternative ways to make returns

If you are unable to return your Library or technology items on the scheduled days or you are enrolled in summer classes and need to continue using technology on loan, please fill in this form. 

Worried About Zoom Bombing? Download Zoom 5.0!

Posted on by San Mateo County Community College District

Zoom has released new security features on its latest update:

1. Quick reporting for Zoombombing. There have been reports of trolls crashing Zoom video calls. Should a host need to deal with this issue, Zoom has made it easier to boot out unwanted invaders with a new “report user” button.

2. Easy navigation. The Zoom 5.0 update will optimize its user interface so hosts no longer have to rummage through the site to find security options. Zoom will now feature a new easy-access button on the host’s meeting menu bar. You can use it to lock meetings, restrict screen sharing and remove participants.

3. Default waiting room. The existing waiting room feature on Zoom allows hosts to keep guests in a virtual waiting room. When a guest enters the waiting room, the host is then notified and prompted to approve him or her. This feature will now be on by default.

4. Default meeting passwords. Generating a password for guests to enter a Zoom call will now be a default feature on the video conferencing platform. Accessing recorded meetings on the cloud will also require a password by default.

5. Shrouding your notifications. With the Zoom 5.0 update, hosts can opt to veil their Zoom Chat notifications from nosey participants.

6. 256-bit AES-GCM encryption. In layman’s terms, this means Zoom will encrypt your data with a 256-bit key to prevent internet intruders from deciphering your personal information. The means your data in cloud will be even more secure.

7. Manage Participants. change the settings so that only people who are signed-in to their account with the email they were invited to the call through can join the call.

8. Lock Meetings. Lock the meeting after everyone you want there is there, that way no new people can join.

9. File Transfers. Turn off file transfers, private chat & annotations.

Remember as the host you can disable the camera & mute certain participants, permanently or temporarily if needed, you can also remove them. Using Waiting room feature to help control who comes & who goes, don’t let unexpected guest in. 

Additional information about the new version can be found here.