Tag: StaffHelp

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New SMART Interactive Displays (Smartboards)

Several new SMART Interactive Displays (aka Smartboards) have been installed throughout the district this summer. Traditional connectivity to computers at teacher desks often requires new cabling. In the meantime, these SMART Interactive Displays do not require a computer at all to operate. From the board itself, you can login, use the Whiteboard, present Google Slides, show Youtube video’s, draw or annotate on top of anything displayed, etc. You can also connect and present from your computer wirelessly using SMART Mirror (newest Smartboards) or SMART Screen Share (new Smartboards over the past few years). Finally, if direct connection from your laptop to the Smartboard is required and we haven’t reached you with new cabling, you can connect directly to the ports on the front, side or underneath the board. Using these USB ports, you can also directly connect a supported document camera and launch the Visualizer app to present and annotate from the front of your classroom!

Please visit SMART’s short training videos to sharpen your skills in using Smart Interactive Displays: https://www.smarttech.com/en/professional-learning/interactive-displays-powered-by-iq
We recommend that you start with #1 – Personalize, “Sign in to the board” – This is where all of your settings, content, etc will be saved and follow you throughout the campus/district on these. We’ll be providing mini keyboards to help with sign-in, searching and general usage of the Smartboard as soon as we can get them to you.

Teachers, if you did not receive one of the newest Smartboards, we are sorry. Unfortunately, it will take time and funds to get all older Smartboards replaced but the wheels are in motion and getting innovative teaching tools like this to your classroom is important to us!

Staff – TAC/ESchool VPN

UPDATE 2/1/2023 2:26pm – New Macbook instructions below. We’re working on the solution for Windows systems… Update 6:52pm – New Windows instructions below..

Instructions for MAC and WINDOWS below:

Staff with school issued Windows laptops — We are rolling out a VPN configuration to your computers that doesn’t rely on the state VPN. This is being provided temporarily while we study making it permanent, if possible. It should install soon after connecting to the Internet. It could take up to 30 minutes before the install starts.

  1. Click the Wifi icon (bottom right next to the clock)
  2. Click VPN (Windows 11) or BPSD-VPN (Windows 10; this is step 3 also – skip to 4)
    ** If you do not see this option yet, your laptop hasn’t applied the policy. If you’ve been connected to the Internet and actively using your laptop for a while (15-30minutes), please reboot and try again. We have some additional steps we can take to try to prompt the install if it doesn’t install as expected.
  3. Click BPSD-VPN
  4. Click Connect
  5. You should be prompted for your username and password
    Enter your SCHOOL short username (The part before @bentonschools.org; ie: jdoe)
    Enter your SCHOOL password (the password you login to email with, not the one you use for TAC, eSchool,etc and click OK
  6. When finished, Repeat steps 1-3 above and click “Disconnect“
    Please – Always Disconnect when finished working for this session so others can use this resource!

After successfully connecting to the VPN use the following links to access the resources that you need:
TAC – https://www.bentonschools.org/tac
ESchool – https://www.bentonschools.org/eschool
EFinance – https://www.bentonschools.org/eFinance


Staff with school issued Macbooks — We are rolling out a VPN configuration to your computers that doesn’t rely on the state VPN. This is being provided temporarily while we study making it permanent, if possible. It should install any minute as long as you are connected to the Internet.

  1. Click the Wifi icon in the top right corner of your Macbook desktop
  2. Click “Network Preferences“
  3. Click “BPSD VPN” in the list in the left column.
    ** If you do not see it yet, your Macbook hasn’t applied the policy. Reboot and try again. Some policies may only apply after rebooting.
  4. Check the box at the bottom “Show VPN status in menu bar” and Apply.
    ** This will place a new VPN icon in the top right corner of your screen. Left of the wifi icon, left of the battery icon. It looks similar to a battery or the grill on the front of a Jeep.
  5. Click the red X (top left) to get out of this settings window.
  6. Click the VPN icon described in step 4 above
  7. Click Connect BPSD VPN
  8. Your username should be listed.
    Enter your SCHOOL password (the password you login to email with, not the one you use for TAC, eSchool, etc) and click OK
  9. You should now be able to access resources as if you were on campus!
  10. When finished, Click the VPN icon described in step 4 above and click “Disconnect BPSD VPN“
    Please – Always Disconnect when finished working for this session so others can use this resource!

After successfully connecting to the VPN use the following links to access the resources that you need:
TAC – https://www.bentonschools.org/tac
ESchool – https://www.bentonschools.org/eschool
EFinance – https://www.bentonschools.org/eFinance

UPDATE 2/1/2023 1:05pm – Stay tuned… We should have a solution very soon…

UPDATE 2/1/2023 11:25am
The state VPN (F5) that is used to access eSchool, TAC, EES, etc from remote networks is currently experiencing a licensing issue causing it to reach max capacity which is preventing users from connecting. This is an issue at the state level; however, BPSD IT is currently looking into options to alleviate this issue.

F5 VPN Error - The maximum number of concurrent user sessions has been reached. No new user sessions can start at this time.
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Original Post
AS OF 2/1/2023 – Please use the directions above for VPN access..
Staff – ESchool/TAC – Friday, April 3, 2020

To access TAC, E-School or E-Finance from home you must first connect to the APSCN VPN.  Instructions for the VPN are here: ApscnVPN via F5 (Jan 2021) (Updated 3/16/2021 with Jan 2021 version)

Once connected to the VPN, Even if the option isn’t displayed, TAC should be reachable at www.bentonschools.org/tac and ESchool at www.bentonschools.org/eschool

MAC USERS:
If you get the following message, please follow these instructions to Reinstall the F5 VPN (link).

WINDOWS USERS:

If you get the error shown above for Mac users (The session reference number: nnnnnnnn):

  1. You will need to install a new version of the F5 VPN for accessing TAC.
  2. Click the start button (lower left corner), type in “Software Center” (without the quotes) then click the App to open it
  3. Select the “2021 F5 VPN Install” – follow the prompts.
    *** If it asks for the server enter: apscnvpn.k12.ar.us
  4. Select TAC and/or login when prompted.