IT Support Officers

David is right when he says that support staff in schools have a strong contribution to make.
At the national technicians consultative conference last year I met support managers from various local authorities that are now being placed in schools and resource centres to manage the ever-increasing numbers of support staff needed. Support managers are distinctly different from business managers and have a technical support background and managerial training.
East Lothian has one of the lowest technician / pupil ratios in Scotland and my conservative estimate would be that we are as much as ten years behind the lead councils. If we start to change now it wouldn’t take that long to catch up. It’s amazing just what can be done with a little encouragement.

The Guardian reports that Currys (www.currys.co.uk) have launched a "Tech Guys" service. Their role isn't to fix broken things - equipment is more reliable than ever - but to show bewildered people how to use the kit they've got. Details here http://www.guardian.co.uk/retail/story/0,,1865144,00.html.

This is going to be a big problem in education as the rate of change in ICT continues to increase. But technical IT staff generally aren't well placed to help. They can get a program working, for example, but finding out what it can do, or hand-holding, isn't usually seen as part of their role.

Large businesses often create business system support teams to help. These are made up of experts from the business area, such as finance, who have a good aptitude for IT. They keep their main job, but are given the rights to deal with day-to-day support issues in their area (such as password changes on financial systems) and will be experts on how the IT system helps get the job done. They're the kind of people everyone in an office asks for help when new systems are introduced, and will often run training sessions on new or changed systems. IT departments are happy, as these people handle helpdesk calls that don't require specialist IT skills. They also provide a rich source of user feedback for improvements. The people involved usually see it as a welcome development opportunity.

Systems thinkers sometimes argue that emergence of a co-ordinator role indicates a systemic problem. Simply put, if systems fit together smoothly they don't need co-ordinated. Creating the role doesn't fix the underlying problem: it manages the symptoms. Perhaps creating a "educational systems support" team could help eliminate the root cause? From what Brian says, it sounds like technicians could make a strong contribution.

Other local councils have anticipated the future need for increased technical support by training existing technical support staff in schools to assist in the day to day administration of IT systems, hardware and software.
This necessitated re grading and updating of job descriptions etc but has proved to be of economical and logistical benefit to the local authorities that have instigated and invested in such schemes.