AUSD saves $12,000 Annually by Going Google

Atascadero Unified School District is saving money and making improvements by changing the way employees send and receive email through Gmail.

Previously, the district licensed Groupwise, the email and computer networking system from Novell, but as of today (July 18), the plug gets pulled on that system and the district will move to Google for email and Microsoft for networking.

One of the main factors of interest for Atascadero was that Gmail is easily accessible through all web browsers, anybody can view and collaborate on their shared email and calendar on any Internet-connected computer. Another big draw was that no software is needed be to access the ever growing service.

Director of Technology Candy Smet said making the switch to Google for the district’s email and calendar needs frees up physical computer equipment which will be repurposed. And because Google handles the email instead of the district, the change cuts down on in-house maintenance costs. To make the switchover as seamless as possible, Smet said she hired a Google-certified trainer to teach the systems to district employees over three days and will likely hold another training day later on.

Smet said:

I was shocked at how well the training days were received, we had teachers that really aren’t techy that came out of there telling others about it. Teachers just glowing and seeing what they could do with their students.

One glowing person was Executive Assistant to the Superintendent Stacey Philips.

The calendaring aspect is the biggest thing. The rescheduler will automatically tell you if people attending a meeting have the new time available, that and it’s essentially free.

IAll of Google’s email, calendaring and docs services are available for free to anybody who wants to sign up at www.gmail.com — not just school employees. Beside moving email and calendaring services to Google, the district is migrating its server software and networking infrastructure from Novell to a Microsoft solution.

Read more over at  http://goo.gl/scvNa