From Planet Bizarre!

[Mark Greenberg]

The high school at which I teach has no textbooks, all the course  
content being delivered over the Internet and local network  
resources.  Last week I arrived to open the school only to find that  
all our network infrastructure was down -- online district utilities  
for email, grading, and attendance; the internet, which has most of  
the course content; and the connection to the on-campus servers that  
authenticate the student and teacher logins and house the students'  
work and additional course materials.  Even our phone system was down  
for some reason.  In the past we've lost our network connections for  
brief periods of time due to problems with the microwave relaying  
system that connects us to the district, but this was more widespread.

Students began arriving about an hour after I first arrived.  A few  
of us teachers got together and figured out some make-shift  
activities that lasted about two hours.  Then we let the students  
take a break.  As the highest ranking educator on campus at the time,  
I used that opportunity to run upstairs to where the technicians  
work.  There were two district technicians there. I'll call them Tom  
and Harry.

Me:  "Tom, I'd like to know whether the problem with our network is  
likely to last very much longer so we can figure out what to do with  
the students.  They're on break right now."

Tom:  "Harry was working on that.  He's in the bathroom."

Me to Harry after he returns to his desk:  "Harry, can you give me  
any idea about how long this network problem might last so we can  
make some decisions about what to do with the kids?"

Harry, shrugging his shoulders and raising both hands: "I have  
nothing to do with the Internet."

Me:  "The kids are on break right now.  Do you think that this is  
likely to last all day or just a short while?"

Harry:  "All I can do is run a local diagnostic and report to the  
district."

Me:  "Well, can you do that?"

Harry:  "Do what?"

Me:  "Run the diagnostic and let the district know what's going on."

Harry:  "I already told you that's what I'm doing."

It took three days to get vital instructional services restored, and  
an additional day to reimage all the student computers, which they  
chose to do during school hours.  On that fourth day we were told it  
was a virus that brought down the network.

My point in relaying this story is that techs and practitioners speak  
a different language and have different views of tech support  
situations.  Techs usually come across as cryptic and evasive to us,  
while we, evidently, come across as idiots to techs.  In reality,  
techs are not usually as techy as they present themselves, and most  
practitioners are not as idiotic as the stereotype either.  For  
example, our campus tech told me we couldn't load Revolution on the  
student computers because the computers only have 40 GB hard drives,  
and Revolution would take up 30 Gigs of that space.  She was holding  
the Revolution CD in her hand as she said this.  I had to sit her  
down and walk her through the process to show her her error.  And I'm  
just a teacher.

Since this seems to be a communication problem that affects tech/ 
practitioner relations everywhere, how do we get past it?