For those who do technology in schools and colleges, the notion of a summer break or vacation is a myth, an oxymoron. Oh sure, they may get a week or so away from the job during late June or July. But for techies, there is no downtime during summertime. Summer is the marathon, the sustained march toward fall opening. It means cleaning up the lingering IT problems from last year as well as installing new hardware, software and systems that absolutely, positively, must, without question, work as promised when students and faculty return to campus in September.
Summer is when the dozens of old computers in each computer lab are replaced.
Summer is when hundreds of seemingly ancient computers in faculty and administrative offices head off-campus, replaced by the faster, better, smarter computers that were promised long ago. Summer is when the last segment of the wire that completes the campus network is installed into aging offices, classrooms and campus dorms. In sum, summer is when IT happens. The two months between June 15 and August 15 witness a surge in long hours and hard work to upgrade and enhance the IT infrastructure in schools and colleges. And make no mistake, it is often a mad rush to get it all done by about August 15th, before students begin to arrive.