Technology update: Learn Platform trims licenses and Nearpod usage rises; dark‑fiber redundancy splicing due mid‑June

Mister Redford Webb, introduced at the June 10 Curriculum, Instruction & Technology committee meeting, provided a technology update that covered the district’s Learn Platform rollout, application‑approval workflow, data‑security work and a dark‑fiber redundancy project.

Webb said Learn Platform’s initial deployment allowed the district to identify and trim unused licensing, saving roughly $26,000 last year and about $10,000 this year by reducing duplicate licenses and consolidating paid services. "We were able to shave $26,000 last year on unused licensing," he said, and credited professional development with large increases in district usage of Nearpod and other district‑favored tools. Webb reported Nearpod teacher usage increased from roughly 55–60 teachers to nearly 125 teachers this year following training.

He walked the committee through the platform’s app‑request workflow: staff submit a request with building, grade level, special‑education needs, device and cost information; the request routes to the building principal and special‑education reviewer (Doctor Ryder was named in the process) and then to Webb’s team and Miss D'Orazio for data‑security and integration checks. Webb said some applications are age‑restricted or require parental consent and the platform flags those conditions; the district may block apps that request more user information than acceptable and offer alternative tools (Webb cited chess.com vs. ChessKids as an example of a moderated alternative).

On security and policy, Webb said planned revision of policy 83815 was deferred while the team completed data‑security work tied to Learn Platform; a penetration test (PenTest) report will be presented in the June executive session and incident‑response plans are being updated after a recent tabletop exercise.

Webb also briefed the committee on a network dark‑fiber project approved in November intended to provide redundant network paths after a May 2023 outage that cut three elementary schools off for most of the day. He said the physical splicing work is expected to be completed in mid‑June, after which the district will work with the Chester County Intermediate Unit (CCIU) network team (ChescoNet) on logical routing to provide automatic failover, noting the district expects a brief 1–2 minute failover window rather than extended outages.

Committee members asked about approval scope, student access and whether installs require repeated approval across buildings and grade levels; Webb said teachers request apps on behalf of students and paid apps typically require principal approval and building‑level review before districtwide installation. He estimated the team has engaged with about 3,000 distinct applications in the Learn Platform since July 1, 2023 and received roughly 25 requests in the past two months, with typical security review turnaround measured in days.

Webb closed by noting summer work will include rollovers and cleanup of older unapproved applications. No committee action was taken; PenTest findings and some items will appear in the June executive session and the fiber project is expected to be functionally complete over the summer.