Two things, this news piece:

Call to let children hunt in NSW national parks

As if the “let anyone shoot in parks from March” thing isn’t bad enough, this is just insane, sorry. Are we just handing ourselves over to an American-style gun lobby or what? It really seems like people will be killed with this move, because no matter how much any given group of gun owners thinks they’re safe, I can guarantee that a good percentage of them won’t be! Add kids to the mix… even worse.

If people want to do this shooting, they can do it on private land or private shooting ranges. That’s it. Anything else is bullshit, and a danger to the public.

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Then there was a small debate online at work — about IT deployment in schools, the nature of support and the “approved” technology, and this whole thing just gets me again. It’s not life or death, but it’s serious for my professional attitude, and professional future.

I can’t stand the attitude of “corporate” IT that prefers to dictate “standards” to staff and lord control over them. This is an old and flawed model. People have taken control of their IT, and if IT departments want to have any future at all, they need to work with their users and help the users achieve their goals, not continue to think they can dictate to them. Anything else is a waste of time.

My professional attitude is that I will help you solve the problem you need to solve, to educate how you think it is best done, and to give students the best experience possible. IT departments are stuck in a 90s attitude (at best) and with lower budgets and changing models there needs to be different tools considered. This will mean iPads and other tablets now, and hopefully Chromebooks and similar tools in the future, just for starters. Still waiting for our Google Apps implementation… if this doesn’t get along I feel as if I’ll just set up ourselves!

Still, it’s about being proactive and helping the people you’re here to help, not telling them what to do.