Parent+Letter+Home

final Form Sent to Parents is Here:

Dear Parent/Guardian, Our district has partnered with the online service ePals to provide filtered and monitored email addresses for our students in grades 3-8. This service supports our vision that teachers will use the many online tools available to enhance the learning environment. Our staff are investigating the use of wikis, blogs, and email as strategies to help students organize their learning and to communicate with others. In order for our students to use these tools, they must have an email address. The ePals online service is provided free to schools, through funding by National Geographic and Google. They offer a filtered email service that monitors incoming mail to students and works to keep out illicit content. They also monitor the messages our students write, and flag messages for teachers to review if they contain inappropriate words or images. The ePals service provides a network of classrooms worldwide that our students and teachers can partner with to learn about different languages and cultures. We have had several classrooms successfully piloting the ePals service over the past three months and are now ready to expand this opportunity. The law requires that we obtain your permission for your child (under the age of 13) to participate in ePals. To facilitate the use of these new learning tools, we would like to ask that parents (regardless of your student’s age) fill out the form linked below or submit it on paper if needed. The ePals service, is committed to protecting student’s online privacy. We have created a Frequently Asked Questions document which is available online at this link and the permission form is located here. Please don’t hesitate to call me at 235-3535 or email djenkins@egrps.org with concerns or questions. Sincerely, Doug Jenkins Director of Tech and Assessment East Grand Rapids Schools djenkins@egrps.org 616-235-3535
 * __**Parental Consent**__: ePals does not allow anyone under 13 years of age to join on their own.
 * **__Personal Information__**: ePals does not collect personally identifiable information from anyone under 13 years of age without a parent, guardian, or teacher’s consent.
 * **__Minimal Information__**: Even after ePals obtains parental, guardian, or teacher consent, they do not collect more personal information about children than is required to participate in an activity while visiting the ePals site.
 * **__Use of Information__**: ePals uses the information they collect to provide an interactive online experience, to send newsletters, to make reading recommendations, to provide educational content that the child may be interested in or would benefit from, and to fulfill requests for products or services.
 * **__Protecting Your Child’s Privacy__**: ePals monitors online forums to remove personally identifiable personal information when they see it.

PARENTAL CONSENT I give permission for my child to participate in ePals SchoolMail™ and the Global Community™. My child can receive e-mail messages from ePals about the service, and receive future offers from ePals based on his or her preferences, as well as promotional updates about site and service content again within their preference settings.
 * For a complete description of the information we collect from children, how we use that information, and what information we share with third parties, please see** [|**http://www.epals.com/privacy/**]**.** I understand that I have the right to review the information ePals has collected about my child, and that I can later revoke my consent by submitting my request at http://www.epals.com/feedback/form/form.e for directing ePals to delete my child’s personal information from its databases.
 * Building: || Grade * 5 ||
 * Child's First and Last Name: || Child's Birth Date: ||
 * Parent/Guardian Name: || Relationship to Child: ||
 * Please enter your preferred email address in case we need to reach you: ||  ||
 * Tag this... ||   ||

November 4th Goal for completion

Purpose:

Elementary- Allow students to weave this into curriculum before/during/after school Consistency of platform, programs are installed and work To allow parents to see student's good work This is a pilot program and students can model 24/7/365 access

Secondary- Decision to not take these home

Letter needs to contain- Purpose items from above in one paragraph Second paragraph to contain responsibilities Child, Parent, Teacher sign off that student is responsible

On the back we'd put two screen shots about how to Call the hotline if you have connection issues

Engage 1:1 Pilot Parents,

Toward the goal of providing greater access to learning, we would like to begin allowing students to take their netbook computers home. We hope that this will provide a seamless transition into their day outside of school and also give you as parents an opportunity to see their work up close. As this is a pilot of what future access might be like, allowing the machines to travel home more closely models a true 1:1 Student to Laptop structure. We are excited about the possibilities that this new form of connected learning holds for the future and excited that your child is at the forefront of this movement.

We expect that students will act responsibly in transporting and using these netbooks outside of school. This means that they'll need to use the double protection of the provided padded bag and also a book bag or backpack. These are to be kept dry at all times and that means using the third layer of a plastic bag over the padded bag on rainy days. Students are not to eat or drink while using the netbooks as we want to keep debris out of the keyboards and also to keep them safe from potential spills. A broken screen or laptop that comes back to school wet will result in the loss of take-home privileges.

As these netbooks belong to the district, maintaining them during this pilot is the responsibility of the district technology department. If a netbook needs repair or maintenance students are to report issues to their teacher who will be the first point of contact on coordinating a fix. Vandalism or defacing any laptop or accessory is strictly prohibited. Use by students for commercial, illegal, unethical, and inappropriate use is expressly prohibited. Students are to comply with copyright laws. Downloading games or software is expressly prohibited. Students are not to install software or printers on these laptops, as provisions will be made that will allow students to submit work electronically. For more detail on our district acceptable use policy, visit our school board policy site ([]) and enter 4510 in the search window.

Security Validation Certificate on Kablink needs turned on!

I understand these responsibilities and agree to uphold them:

Digital Signature (Student)__Date___ Digital Signature (Parent) __Date___ Digital Signature (Teacher)__Date___

No, I do not wish to have my son or daughter bring home a netbook at this time.

On the first three nights students take home the netbooks, we will open up our district help desk ( 616-773-2877) in the evening from 5:30pm to 8:30 pm to help with connectivity to your home networks. We have posted instructions for attaching these to a home wireless network __here__. Please fill out the below survey in order to assist us in providing this support.

What sort of network connectivity do you have at your home? Dialup Cable DSL Do not have home access

Who is your Internet Service provider?

Do you have a wireless network at home? Yes, no

If so do you know the name (SSID) and access key (Passphrase, WEP Key, WPA)? Yes, no