September 6, 2023 at 11:00 AM - Information Services Committee Meeting

Discussion:  Call to order at 11:00 AM.

Staff:  Kraig Lofquist, Deb Hericks, Priscilla Quintana, Scott Isaacson

Discussion:  The Technology Director gave updates on the GEER process.  

Additional robotics items totalling $1,363,594.10 were ordered in July. About 86% of these items have been delivered to schools and the remainder are expected to be delivered during September. It is possible that an additional $100,000 in GEER II funds will become available and may be applied toward additional robotics items in September as well. The ESUCC’s contract for this project provides $136,363 in administrative costs to offset the time and effort of staff used to organize, purchase items and support this process.

 

Discussion:  The Technology Director gave updates on FRDLC.

On the Proofpoint Security Awareness and Training platform, 141 school districts and ESUs have registered 14,098 users. In the next two months, we will be opening a year-two sign up period to see who will continue with the platform, or which new districts will want to participate.

45 school districts and ESUs are participating in the Duo Security multi-factor authentication licensing, with 8,600 licenses purchased. 1,400 licenses remain at the subsidized price of $2 per user for this contract year. Pricing will be $5 per user for the year beginning March 30, 2024. We will open a year-two sign up period in February, 2024.

The Nebraska Canvas consortium has moved under the ESUCC, including the Canvas licensing and two staff members (Shara Johnson and Tammy Cheatum) who train and support schools in adopting and using the system. 186 school districts and ESUs are participating, totalling 90,149 licensees at this year’s rate of $4.50 per user. The team is investigating a Canvas system administrator certification program and plans to introduce this to ESU and school district technical staff during this school year. Help desk: necavas@esucc.org

 

Discussion:  The Technology Director gave updates on cybersecurity.

The Nebraska state committee for the State and Local Cybersecurity Grant Program met on August 24, 2023 and voted to advance 3 (all) ESU-related sub-grant proposals in the funding process:

• Nebraska Cybersecurity Network (10 ESUs participating) - staffing and support for cybersecurity assessments
• ESUCC - staffing and hosting support for the CSET assessment tool and Proofpoint implementations
• 7 ESUs - contracted cybersecurity assessment services and support.

The submitters of these projects should have received notification from the state committee of their status and that they will move forward in the process. Next, these projects will be included in the Nebraska state cybersecurity plan and submitted to the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) (federal) reviewers for final approval. While we don’t know the time required for this review and approval, Patrick Wright has made every effort to accelerate that process by having the plan reviewed in progress before the final list of projects was determined. It was discussed at the August 24th meeting that ideally this approval may take 1-2 months.

Discussion: 

Presentation from Andrew Sherman of the Nebraska Library Commission (NLC):

Small and rural libraries are looking for assistance with the maintenance and support of their staff and public PCs and networking/WiFi, and turning to ESUs as possible providers of that service.

PC support would consist of the purchasing and installation of new PCs and support of existing PCs and related software for likely 4-6 PCs at a typical location. Many of the public-use PCs and Chromebooks have not been secured properly.

Networking would include CIPA filtering at our E-Rate libraries and network upgrades as the libraries migrate to the high-speed (fiber) Internet. Most of the libraries are utilizing their ISP-provided WiFi router as the network with maybe a dumb switch in the mix. Thus, few of our small and rural libraries have proper cybersecurity measures in place. DNS filtering may be a first step, but firewalls will be better over the long term, especially as they migrate to high-speed Internet services. E-Rate will be the primary funding vehicle for the libraries’ Internet and network upgrades and the NLC can assist them with that process.

The NLC is close to rolling out a cloud filtering solution for the libraries using DNSFilter. Any libraries that choose to utilize Network Nebraska will need a security appliance in place. Ideally, all the libraries will have a firewall in place at some point.

Discussion:  Nate McClenahan shared that there were no updates in August. The turning over to a new school year continues to improve for ESUs as they have been through the process many times. There is still some support that is needed for service rollover and logging changes. We are looking forward to some new updates and innovations as the new year starts with conversations around showcasing ESU impact.

Discussion:  The Technology Director shared that we have a new employee, Todd Hatcher.  

Discussion:  The Digital Learning Coordinator shared highlights from his reports.  

Discussion:  The Executive Director gave updates on colleges having access to our OER instance.  

Discussion:  The meeting adjourned at 12:08 PM.