Author: Mark Salzer

If you’re looking for a quick checklist reminder…

Google recently announced they are ending their Go Links service after 11 years.  See https://killedbygoogle.com/ for more on this and other shuttered services.  Shortened links created at links.pccsk12.com are not expected to resolve to their associated actual URLs after June 15th. Please know the district’s Technology Department is working to migrate most of the links created via this service to another service and will have another posting on our progress later this month.

This year’s Webby Awards were announced this week. Some notable websites to check out include:

Mathigon https://mathigon.org/ a cool website filled with neat and unexpected ways to explore math.

A to Z AI https://atozofai.withgoogle.com/intl/en-US/ A-Z guide offers a series of simple, bite-sized explainers to help anyone understand what AI is, how it works and how it’s changing the world around us.

Missing the Code https://missing-code.com/ highlights the contributions of women in some areas of computer coding (note it has a couple of poor word choices)

NASA Bring Space to Students Through Virtual Learning https://www.nasa.gov/stem-at-home-for-students-k-4.html Like the name suggests….

FABRICIUS https://artsexperiments.withgoogle.com/fabricius/en Explore Fabricius, a Google Arts & Culture Lab Experiment that uses machine learning to help translate ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs.

Generator Z https://generator-z.org/ Generator Z is an ideas lab that launched in 2020 for teens and afterschool providers to reimagine the future of afterschool in Southeast Michigan and Western New York.

You might also want to check out the apps they cite for recognition.

For those teaching math, consider checking out PBS’s Learning Media May newsletter which has a focus on math. See some screenshots from the newsletter below to have your interest peaked.

I wanted to alert our community to a benefit program that I hope we can spread the word about to our eligible families. In the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2021 which was recently signed into law, Congress has specifically carved out $3.2 billion dollars to provide Emergency Broadband relief (a discount of up to $50 per month towards broadband service) to qualifying eligible households. Eligible households can also receive a one-time discount of up to $100 to purchase a laptop, desktop computer, or tablet from participating providers if they contribute more than $10 and less than $50 toward the purchase price.

As of May 12, 2021, eligible households will be able to enroll in this program to receive a monthly discount off the cost of broadband service from an approved internet service provider (American Broadband, Charter, Comcast, T-Mobile/Metro by T-Mobile, and Wow are among these ISPs). Eligible households can enroll through their approved internet service provider or by visiting https://getemergencybroadband.org.

A household is eligible if a member of the household meets one of the criteria below:

• Has an income that is at or below 135% of the Federal Poverty Guidelines or participates in certain assistance programs, such as SNAP, Medicaid, or Lifeline;
• Approved to receive benefits under the free and reduced-price school lunch program or the school breakfast program, including through the USDA Community Eligibility Provision in the 2019-2020 or 2020-2021 school year;
• Received a Federal Pell Grant during the current award year;
• Experienced a substantial loss of income due to job loss or furlough since February 29, 2020 and the household had a total income in 2020 at or below $99,000 for single filers and $198,000 for joint filers; or
• Meets the eligibility criteria for a participating provider’s existing low-income or COVID-19 program.

Check out the Broadband Benefit Consumer FAQ for more information about the benefit and please continue to check this page for program updates.

Please note, the benefit program described above is different from the permanent Lifeline program, which is another benefits program some of our families qualify for and likely could benefit from — thanks for sharing news of both for their consideration.

A new version of the Zoom app will be available next week for download at https://zoom.us/download. Zoom will also be performing a staggered release for iOS and Android on applicable app stores. This update will include the release of the Immersive Views feature (see description below) and minor bug fixes.

April 26, 2021 version

New and enhanced features

• Meeting/webinar features
  • Immersive Views 
    Recreate the feel of your class or conference room by placing video participants onto a single virtual background. Participants are automatically placed onto provided scenes, but the host can upload their own custom background and adjust the arrangements as needed. This requires client version 5.6.3 or higher and works best when using Virtual Background, but not required.

Resolved issues

• Minor bug fixes
• Resolved an issue for a subset of users regarding crashes when switching audio devices
• Resolved an issue for a subset of users regarding an inability to end a webinar

See these articles for more info:

Mac – https://support.zoom.us/hc/en-us/articles/201361963
Windows – https://support.zoom.us/hc/en-us/articles/201361953
Android – https://support.zoom.us/hc/en-us/articles/201361973
iOS – https://support.zoom.us/hc/en-us/articles/201361943
Linux – https://support.zoom.us/hc/en-us/articles/205759689

On Sunday, April 25th Zoom will be enabling new Zoom Phone features in the Zoom for GSuite Add-On that will prompt all staff users under our account to reauthorize Zoom for GSuite Add-On’s access. All Zoom for GSuite Add-On users will be prompted to reauthorize access to contacts and the company directory when attempting to schedule a Zoom meeting within Google Calendar; staff can also reauthorize in the Google Sidebar (see image below). Users will only need to reauthorize once. Because we are not a Zoom Phone customer, the add-on will not actually access our contacts or district directory, but reauthorization will nonetheless be required in order to continue using the add-on’s schedule meetings functionality. 

If a user declines the reauthorization, the Zoom for GSuite Add-On will no longer be able to be used to schedule meetings.

BrainPop’s April newsletter for K-12 instructional staff can be found HERE.

As a reminder, all district students, K-12 can access our paid subscription to BrainPop/BrainPop Jr via Clever at https://clever.com/in/pccs

Pics below show some of what’s in their latest newsletter.