How an All-in-One School System Helps K-12 Education

Like an SIS on steroids, an all-in-one school system is the framework for an entire educational operation, freeing time for virtually every person who has a role to play in education from some of the minutia of running a school. Not only does an all-in-one school system enhance the process of educating K-12 students, but it can also save districts money through efficiency, consistency, and having an abundance of robust data in one place.

Benefits of an All-in-One School System

Providing K-12 students with a well-rounded education presents a variety of challenges that run the gamut of individual requirements, from unique health concerns and diverse backgrounds to different learning abilities and speeds. Yet students are put into classrooms, for the most part, based on nothing more than being in the same grade, putting pressure on educators to teach to a disparate group while also meeting district and state curriculum standards.

Lumen™ Touch is committed to providing best-in-class solutions to schools and school districts, making it easier to support teachers, students, families, and communities. Our ongoing mission is to revolutionize K-12 education. Lumen Touch’s Bright SUITE™ is a one-stop-shop for schools, incorporating everything a district needs, from a learning management system to student information systems to health-and-safety monitoring and reporting. An all-in-one school system like Bright SUITE can support the teaching process in the following ways:

Consistency

An all-in-one school system can ensure that students receive a consistent and high-quality education throughout their K-12 journey. Not only can the system track their progress from one grade to another, but it gives a complete picture of the student, including health, behavioral information, and gaps in achievement.

Collaboration

One of the additional benefits teachers can realize with an all-in-one system is improved collaboration. Teachers can share resources, lesson plans, and ideas – not only throughout their own school but with other schools as well.  The system also provides a centralized location for teachers to organize and store course materials, such as lecture notes, assignments, and multimedia resources, making it easier for students to access and review course content from any location.

Personalized Learning

Teachers can leverage the technology and data available in the learning management system to help meet the needs of students through individualized learning. While there is a SPED component to the all-in-one solution, the technology provides teachers with tools to differentiate instruction and personalize learning for all students. Teachers can assign different tasks, provide additional resources, and monitor progress, to provide targeted support for students who need it. It can be used to help students work at their own pace, pursue learning that is meaningful to them on an individual basis, and remain engaged.

Streamlined Communication

An all-in-one school system comes with a communication component that makes communicating with parents, teachers, and students easier. It improves parent engagement and promotes parental involvement in their students’ education. Our parent portal within the system allows for parents to stay current in to the health, nutrition, behavior, and academic performance of their students.  Parents can even schedule conferences with teachers. Communication is also documented for teachers and administrators, so everyone is in the know. This can help to improve student engagement and encourage more thoughtful and reflective responses.

Efficiency

The administrative tasks that divert teachers’ attention away from the actual function of teaching – grading, scheduling, attendance tracking, testing – can all be done through the Instructor Suite. This benefit frees teachers’ time and allows them to focus on teaching and student engagement. The Instructor Suite also allows teachers to create and distribute assignments online, which can be submitted electronically by students. This helps teachers to track students’ progress and provide feedback in a timely manner. It will also show teachers if the student has a 504 or an IEP, any health issues, such as allergies or asthma, and associated accommodations.

Why Lumen Touch

With special modules for special education, a full library, and modules for individual user data dashboards, Bright SUITE is an all-in-one enterprise management solution that allows districts to save money, improve student retention, and create a secure and connected school district. Access to real-time data lets educators make the best decisions for all students. Learn more.

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EdTech Is the Future of Education

Educational technology – edtech – really came into its own during the pandemic. A concept that was experiencing slow adoption rates and some resistance in classrooms suddenly became an immediate solution when schools were closed, and students were forced into distance learning. The necessity of online education forced districts and teachers to acknowledge the power of edtech in managing curriculum – and it forced communities to find ways to bridge inequities and ensure that every student had internet access. While inequity remains an ongoing challenge, much progress has been made during the past few years.

EdTech Levels the Playing Field for Students

One of the ways in which edtech enriches the educational experience is by giving students access to more information and more opportunities than they would have had otherwise. Not only does edtech open up possibilities for students to individualize their learning and pursue diverse interests, but it also brings the whole world closer to them. It empowers students while fueling their curiosity; learning becomes more fun.

EdTech Provides Districts Solutions for Complex Challenges

Edtech solutions – from health and safety to security to communication – help districts manage their schools more effectively. Do you even remember the days of paper attendance sheets and manual grading systems? What about trying to keep track of student vaccinations and allergies? All-in-one school systems have removed the burden of administration from the districts while providing them with more comprehensive data so that they can make informed decisions about how to best serve students, parents, and their communities.

EdTech Empowers Educators

Edtech empowers educators by freeing them from the daily minutia involved with teaching, so that they can focus on that which motivated them to join the profession in the first place: impacting young minds. With tools that help grade homework, manage student information, and conduct basic testing, as well as provide solutions for SPED and the cumbersome reporting required, teachers can spend less time doing paperwork and more time with students. This allows teachers to devote more time to individualized educational goals for every student without feeling overwhelmed.

EdTech Is the Future

While there are challenges that must be continually addressed – cybersecurity, student data privacy, data management – edtech offers the ability for schools to deliver a better educational experience that is more efficient and more cost-effective. Edtech is the future of learning. It enables districts to be better partners in their communities, improve engagement with parents and guardians, and fuel student motivation by having the ability to offer new and innovative opportunities in learning.

How to Solve the Data Management Problem in Your District

Managing student and district data can be extremely time consuming and complex. It is a challenge for most school districts, regardless of size. In addition to security concerns, managing servers and integrating student data from multiple applications can be a huge burden to small district IT teams. When you pile compliance and reporting requirements on top of that, the commitment can be more than a district can manage.

If your district IT department is overwhelmed with basic day-to-day data management, hindering their ability to focus on creating a modern digital community that would benefit your entire district, it might be time to consider a different way forward.

All-in-One School Systems Manage Data More Efficiently

An all-in-one enterprise management system not only saves money but also helps create a connected and secure school district. Teachers and administrators gain access to real-time data, which allows them to make better decisions in support of their students. Communications are secure and allow for improved engagement with students and parents. With improved resource efficiency, schools can spend less time focusing on data management and reporting and are able to focus instead on delivering the best learning opportunities. Districts are able to save money while meeting the increased need for administrative tracking, performance analysis, and detailed local and state reporting requirements.

All-in-One School Systems Ensure Safe Rostering of Student Data

One of the biggest data management challenges that districts face is the risk involved in sharing roster data with edtech vendors. Protecting personally identifiable information (PII) is not just the ethical thing to do; in many cases, such safeguards are legislated by federal and state governments. Schools must remain in compliance with student privacy laws and ensure that the vendors with whom they share data are also using strenuous measures to protect that information. By employing an all-in-one school management system, rostering student data can be governed using a centralized, secure process that governs how schools share PII.

Lumen™ Touch Bright SUITE™ All-in-One System Is More than Just Software

Lumen Touch offers to districts an all-in-one solution that is more than just programming and software. Bright SUITE also offers a dedicated partnership with Lumen Touch experts who are part of ensuring your school’s success. Don’t take it from us; hear from one of our Midwestern school district clients:

Not many companies can boast about having a single-platform solution like Lumen Touch that responds to the customer and market demands, that decreases the cost of a comprehensive digital platform in a time of financial crisis and provides the security in a world of cyber insecurity.

– Director of Technology

To learn more about how Lumen Touch empowers the future of learning, get in touch. Email us at mailto:sales@lumentouch.com, call us at 816.880.0066, or visit www.lumentouch.com.

What to Look for in an All-in-One School System

An all-in-one school system is the framework for an entire educational operation, freeing every person who has a role to play in education from some of the minutia of running a school. Here are the key factors to consider when selecting an all-in-one school system.

Benefits of an All-in-One School System

At its very highest level, a comprehensive all-in-one school system makes decision-making easier, by providing real-time data about everything from the edtech solutions that students are using to how many students require vaccinations before the next school year.

For Districts

Your choice of an all-in-one system should provide your district with the ability to easily plug in and organize data, using next-generation data analysis, reporting, and dashboard solutions that help districts make informed decisions. Look for a system that offers the ability to integrate real-time data, reporting, compliance, and tracking in a safe and secure environment.

For School Boards

Your all-in-one system should enhance productivity and be cost-effective. School board members should have their own portal through which they can access meeting minutes and other relevant information to accomplish their duties.

For Principals

Your all-in-one system should allow you to track your students from pre-K through high school and beyond. The advantages of this approach include tremendous cost- and time-saving efficiencies and the ability to accelerate the learning trajectory and wellbeing of each student in a just-in-time manner.

For Administrators

The all-in-one system you select should include a comprehensive communications tool to procure and disseminate all kinds of content, as a means of managing communication and learning for all stakeholders. Look for features that include:

• Prohibited manual uploading of data by external systems
• Curtailing of undo processing and manual entry by staff
• Scheduling of daily student absence notifications, student assignments, progress reports, etc. that may be automatically sent for any school and grade level
• Automatic tracking of all attempted and successful communications made to parents and guardians
• District and school notifications, such as inclement weather reports, cancelled activities, etc.

For Health and Safety Staff

Your all-in-one system should provide you with an efficient student medical record management system that makes available immediate and historical information. All areas of student medical record keeping will be accessible from one screen, including a comprehensive student medical summary to review or print. Look for systems that allow you to record emergency contact information, manage immunizations, handle reporting requirements, and enable Medicaid billing.

For School IT Leaders

Security and compliance are key factors to consider when evaluating an all-in-one system for your school. The system should offer built-in full HIPAA and FERPA compliance, SSL certificates, inherent record locking features, and interoperability. The system should ensure compliance and maintenance of data integrity with little administrative oversight, secure remote access through portals, remote updates from original data sources, large file and directory processing capability, and secure disk storage.

For Teachers

Any all-in-one system your district chooses should be designed to support teachers in their efforts to not only meet standards but also give them the freedom to better engage with their students. Look for an integrated learning solution that focuses on student achievement and teacher peace of mind when it comes to standards-based grading and alignment with Common Core State Standards. This solution should provide an integrated grade book and lesson planner that enables teachers to perform all tasks and access all dashboard information from a single location, including letter grades and student mastery.

Your all-in-one system should also include integrated support for SPED – a comprehensive, federally and state compliant, special education system that manages the complexities and changing dynamics of special education reporting and supports both IEP and 504 management.

For Students

The all-in-one system should empower students to take control of their own education trajectory, allowing them to collaborate with mentors, teachers, and school counselors, as they journey toward college and career success. Students may build a profile that captures accomplishments and follows them throughout their school career.

For Parents

The all-in-one system should make managing a child’s education easy for parents, from facilitating a wide range of communications to paying fees and buying lunches online with ease and security. Information about their students, including report cards and progress reports, school communications, and schedule updates should be readily accessible.

Supporting Education from Every Angle

An all-in-one system provides relevant insight and data about students, to better support their education, health, and safety. A day in the life of a student is managed through the system: The student may be in the cafeteria line and the kitchen staff are immediately alerted to a food allergy when the student buys lunch; the student may be completing an assignment at home on a device of any kind at any time and the assignment becomes immediately available to the teacher; the student may be in the library and the teacher, parent, and mentor are aware that the student has checked a book out; the student may be with a counselor or school nurse and immunizations and transcripts are readily available.

Every stakeholder throughout the school district has access to a portal, and all information is secure and confidential with distributions by permission only. Reports and score cards are available at your fingertips and all students, including those with special education requirements, are catered to in one system.

To learn more about how Bright SUITE, Lumen Touch’s all-in-one system, achieves all of this and more, please get in touch.

What All-in-One EdTech Systems Deliver to K-12 Schools

K-12 schools are compelled to deliver not only quality instruction but also manage social-emotional learning, health mandates, special needs, and education standards that meet state curriculum criteria. Managing all of these demands while also providing a safe learning environment that promotes student engagement and teacher retention is a complex juggling act. All-in-one edtech systems like Lumen™ Touch, that address all of the various demands with which districts are charged, can make a significant and measurable difference in student outcomes, teacher attrition rates, and costs.

All-in-One EdTech Systems Save Time

Instead of being forced to evaluate different solutions for every need your district has, an all-in-one system can provide an entire suite of solutions to meet all your district’s needs with one contract, one implementation, and one support team. When that system is also capable of being customized to meet your specific needs and comes with a library of pre-vetted edtech offerings to enhance student learning, it becomes something more than just a timesaver. Bright SUITE™ frees teachers from the burden of laborious data entry and reporting, giving them time for professional development and closer engagement with students.

All-in-One EdTech Systems Save Money

License fees, rostering, multiple vetting processes, and IT compatibility: When you are piecing together solutions from a variety of sources, not only does your school face increased cybersecurity risks but you also incur increased labor costs. Districts making a switch to Lumen Touch report annual savings in the tens of thousands. They are able to create new efficiencies with inventory management, attendance processing, and data reporting, while simultaneously simplifying compliance.

All-in-One EdTech Systems Give Peace of Mind

Working closely with a single solution provider offers K-12 schools, students, parents, IT leaders, and administrators peace of mind. Lumen Touch has been providing an all-in-one option for 20 years. An all-in-one enterprise management solution not only allows districts to save money, but it also creates a secure and connected school district. Real-time data lets educators make the best decisions for all students.

Why Lumen Touch Bright SUITE?

Lumen Touch not only customizes Bright SUITE for each school, but we build a long and trusting relationship with each district, creating the best environment for success. We provide dedicated support to every district, school, and teacher, including on-site and virtual training. We listen to, and incorporate into future iterations, suggestions from the people using our solutions, often creating custom solutions to make Bright SUITE more effective for an individual school’s needs. Don’t take our word for it, though; here’s what some of our clients have had to say:

“We switched to Lumen from another vendor at the end of the first semester several years ago due to issues with that vendor. I believe Lumen Touch is the best student information system available. They do not accept status quo; they listen to school district needs and desires and are always looking for ways to provide enhancements they believe will benefit school districts. When you need help immediately, there is always a voice on the other end to assist you. Once, when I had an urgent need, I watched three programmers log into our system to solve the issue; all I can say is WOW. That personal and professional touch won me over as a lifetime user of Lumen Touch. I guess you could say I am one of their biggest cheerleaders. Thanks, Lumen Touch, for an awesome system and service.”

“I have been very pleased with my experience with Lumen Touch’s Student Information System. The customer support is very good. I often have questions, and I can just make a quick phone call and get them immediately answered.”

“Lumen Touch has awesome tech support and will help immediately when needed.”

Lumen Touch Bright SUITE is a single-platform solution, providing a team of experts to help schools meet the specific needs of their districts, decrease the cost of having a comprehensive digital platform, and provide security in a world of cyber insecurity.

3 Cybersecurity Teachings to Make Your School Cyber Safe

Some students have already returned to the classroom. Over the next few weeks, the halls of schools around the country will be filled with the sounds of laughter and chaos as the rest of students return. To prepare for the new school year, school districts have been working hard to have in place everything from the right technology to the right staff. But there are three back-to-school goals every school should have in order to ensure cyber safety and peace of mind for students, staff, and parents.

Improve School Cybersecurity

According to The State of Ransomware in Education 2022 report from Sophos,

• Ransomware attacks on (K-12) education have increased 56%
• K-12 schools struggle to thwart ransomware attacks, with 72% of attacks being successful
• 45% of K-12 schools that have experienced an attack paid the ransom to retrieve their encrypted data, with a very small percentage of them actually getting back the entirety of their data.
• K-12 schools spent $1.58 million on ransoms and data recovery last year

Take Action: In order to know where you need to make improvements to your cybersecurity strategy, you need to know where your weaknesses are. That’s why Lumen™ Touch is offering a cybersecurity audit service for schools: Bright LITE. Our customized service offering provides individuals and organizations with the necessary information and education to efficiently evaluate both the risks and opportunities they face.  Download the Bright LITE brochure (PDF)

Protect Student Data

Every year, districts choose new technology solutions that will help deliver the right curriculum to their students. With those choices come concerns about rostering student data multiple times to a variety of different vendors. It can be cost- and time-prohibitive to vet each vendor.

Take Action: Bright PASSPORT governs how schools share personally identifiable information (PII), such as student roster data. Rather than allow teachers or school districts to implement apps for their classrooms as they see fit, thereby increasing cyber risk in the schools, Bright PASSPORT provides districts with a library of approved apps that have been properly vetted to meet the required security standards. Partner with Lumen Touch to meet your student data privacy needs.

Become a Smart, Connected District

A smart, connected school district requires:

A comprehensive school management tool that includes:

• Online registration
• Attendance
• Discipline
• Nutrition services
• Health and wellness
• Truancy
• Transportation
• Fees, fines, and point of sale

A secure database with built-in backup and recovery

A comprehensive teaching and learning system that includes:

• Curriculum and assessment
• Scheduling
• Grade reports and transcripts
• Learning management system
• After-school programs
• Diploma tracking

Real-time reporting:

• Any data, anywhere
• State reporting
• Customized reports
• Real-time goal tracking

Communication tools:

• Customized user portals
• Instant messaging
• Email
• Personalized content

Comprehensive support, including train the trainer

Take Action: Lumen Touch Bright SUITE® provides districts with everything they need to deliver a better educational experience from start to finish. A one-stop-shop for schools, Bright SUITE incorporates everything a district needs, from a learning management system to student information systems to health-and-safety monitoring and reporting. With distinctive modules for special education, a full edtech solution library, and modules for teacher professional development, Bright SUITE is an all-in-one enterprise management solution that not only allows districts to save money, but it also creates a secure and connected school district with real-time data that lets educators make the best decisions for all students. Learn more.

Lumen Touch and Paywat Announce Partnership

Lumen Touch is pleased to announce our partnership with Paywat. Together, we deliver to schools an easy and efficient way for parents to process payments securely. From lunch money to registration fees to library fines, Lumen Touch and Paywat make it easier for schools to receive payments.

No Cost to Schools

As our preferred partner, Paywat is integrated with our systems, adding no additional cost to schools for use of the feature. Parents who choose to use the online payment feature pay a small fee. Parents will simply use the Lumen Touch platform as they normally do; they’ll just have an additional button to pay electronically.

Part of the Lumen Touch Promise

Lumen Touch is committed to providing best-in-class solutions to schools and school districts, making it easier to support teachers, students, families, and the community. As a K-12-focused payment platform that streamlines online payments, this is an important integration.

• Your district’s business office can use the same reports from Lumen Touch that they currently use.
• Funds are directly deposited into school bank accounts on a regular basis; there are no new accounts to track.
• A single balance per user is noted across the entire integrated platform.

We are working to develop even more integrations, including parent engagement and communication tools.

It has never been easier to start using Paywat together with the Lumen Touch system. Just reach out to your Lumen Touch contact today! We’ll give you a quick overview, and once you’re comfortable, we’ll enable the process. Ask Lumen Touch to enable Paywat today.

About Paywat

Located just outside of Philadelphia, Paywat is focused on solving the communication challenges that exist in schools, particularly in regard to collecting payments. Paywat was founded by a parent who was fed up with the convoluted process of making school payments, having to rely on different tools for school payments, fundraising campaigns, communications, and forms processes. Someone had to do better. Our customers believe that we have hit the nail on the head. Learn more at paywat.com

Education Is Headed for the Metaverse

You can’t avoid hearing about the metaverse these days – this relatively new conception is impacting how we envision the future of retail, travel, social media, and of course, education. Still in its infancy, when and how the metaverse will revolutionize education is difficult to predict. But the vision is there.

How Will the Metaverse Impact Education?

There is no question that the metaverse will impact education. What we experienced during the height of the pandemic, with students and teachers being forced into virtual spaces for learning, has only highlighted how important it is to embrace technology. And as jobs of the future require more technical knowledge, we must ensure that students have the opportunity to work with state-of-the-art technology, to better prepare them to be part of the modern workforce. But because the metaverse is still under construction, so to speak, an opportunity exists for education leaders to help ensure the metaverse serves schools and students properly.

Educators Can Lead the Way

In an exciting look at education in the metaverse from Brookings, the authors point out, “Today, as the metaverse infrastructure is still under construction, researchers, educators, policymakers, and digital designers have a chance to lead the way rather than get caught in the undertow.” They paint a picture of interactive, multidisciplinary, cross-curricular education that immerses students directly into the environment about which they are learning. The authors of the Brookings research note that, “the interaction is inherently social with live people and live moment to moment, emotionally laden interactions. And notice that the teachers are still crucial to this experience.”

Experiences in the Metaverse Affect Our Brains Differently

Why is the metaverse such an important consideration for education? Because the learning is active, rather than passive. The learning creates memories for the students of actually being in a place. The Brookings research used ancient Greece as an example, but any historical location could have just as easily been used, or an astronomical phenomenon, or a field trip somewhere that a school could never afford to budget (The Louvre, for example). Stephen Fromkin writes in a Fast Company article, “Interactions in the metaverse give us the impression that we are having real experiences and creating real memories – because we are.”

But What About Measurable Outcomes?

We will hopefully move well beyond standardized testing and measure student success in more practical ways. One form of measurement is engagement. Imagine students being excited about education, being able to interact with figures from history, and being able to step into places from a distance – to touch, feel, and look around while there. A good example of rudimentary AI that is paving the way for education in the metaverse is the Digital Einstein Experience. Try it out. With a simple permission to use your microphone, you can have a conversation with Einstein, and he will respond to your questions.

The metaverse is coming. It is an inevitability. How it will impact education is still up in the air, but we have a huge opportunity to help guide the process to ensure we are meeting the needs of students, teachers, and districts as it becomes more commonplace.

Lumen Touch Empowers the Future of Learning

Connecting every student to opportunity: Those are powerful words, and they are the commitment we’ve made that drives the development of our solutions. But to truly connect every student to opportunity, we need to make it easier for teachers, IT leaders, and administrators to focus on meeting students’ needs and avoid being cluttered with things like managing roster data, monitoring cybersecurity, tracking health, and administering exams. Lumen Touch clears the path so that schools can focus on creating the future of learning.

Managing Roster Data and Ensuring Student Data Privacy with Bright PASSPORT™

The time and labor costs of data entry are something schools don’t calculate until they realize how much time they’re saving by utilizing a single sign-on system that includes a library of fully vetted edtech solutions designed to meet all the needs of every classroom.

Because of the enormous risk involved in sharing roster and other personal student data with multiple edtech vendors, schools must consider how to remain in compliance with student privacy laws and also ensure that the vendors with whom they share data are also using strenuous measures to protect that information. Bright PASSPORT – a centralized, secure method of sharing student data, governs how schools share personally identifiable information (PII), such as student roster data. Rather than allow teachers or school districts to implement apps for their classrooms, Bright PASSPORT provides for districts a library of approved apps that meet the required security standards.

Monitor Cybersecurity with Bright LITE™

Lumen Touch has always provided 24/7 monitoring and managed services support to our schools, but in order to strengthen your cybersecurity, you need to know where your security gaps are.  That’s why Lumen Touch is offering a service for schools called Bright LITE.  Our customized service offering provides individuals and organizations with the necessary information and education to efficiently evaluate both the risks and opportunities they face.

Manage Health and Safety with Bright CARE™

The laborious task of managing health and safety has been thrust into the spotlight in schools, as districts have been forced to manage mask and vaccination requirements, enforce social distancing, and establish isolation protocols. While schools have always needed a health and safety solution for regularly mandated vaccines, allergy management, and trouble-free Medicaid billing for services provided through the schools, the pandemic certainly has made this a much larger priority.

Lumen Touch partnered with Tesseract to offer even more tools through Bright CARE. Bright CARE is a comprehensive student health and medical record management system developed by Lumen Touch. For schools that would benefit, this system can be implemented as a standalone application.

Supporting Educator Professional Development

Bright PATH™ connects educators to dynamic learning opportunities with highly effective learning programs that help streamline professional development. By offering customizable courses and units of study to fit the learning needs of leaders, teachers, and support staff, professional development has never been so easy. As educator professional training and advancement through micro-credentialing gains momentum, Bright PATH provides the sophisticated solution that school administrators need to improve retention rates. Bright PATH provides:

• Just-in-time learning – anywhere, anytime
• Proven best practices for instructors
• One-stop shopping for all members of the education community
• Easy progress monitoring of content learning
• Streamlining of all professional development
• Résumé builder, through Master Teacher
• Free, innovative global content

Make Teachers’ Jobs Easier with Bright SUITE™

Lumen Touch Bright SUITE™ is the total Lumen Touch offering, bringing many advantages including tremendous cost- and time-saving efficiencies. It includes a truly personalized and flexible management system that can meet the unique needs of your individual district while still encompassing characteristic school needs, from special education to student information to library and resources management to student individual plans of study to complete health and wellness management.  Bright SUITE allows students and teachers to embrace technology, to accelerate the trajectory of learning and enhance the well-being of each student. With Bright SUITE, your district will be connecting all students to opportunities!

To learn more about how Lumen Touch empowers the future of learning, get in touch. Email us at mailto:sales@lumentouch.com, call us at 816.880.0066, or visit www.lumentouch.com.

Cybersecurity and Your School

October is Cybersecurity Awareness Month. Most people may assume that the effort in increasing awareness is primarily for the benefit of businesses. While businesses absolutely need to do their part to minimize cyber risk, school districts shoulder as much, if not more, responsibility for maintaining strong cybersecurity. It’s more than just a compliance issue – it’s a matter of doing everything possible to protect student data.

Resources for Improving Cybersecurity in your School

The Cybersecurity & Infrastructure Security Agency, CISA, provides a number of resources for schools. There is also guidance for parents, to help them teach their children to be more cybersecure, with additional resources for schools to assist parents, including:

• Cyber Security Awareness Volunteer Education (C-SAVE) – a scenario-based curriculum for K-12 students.
• Project iGuardian, in partnership with the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) directorate, the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children (NCMEC), and the Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force, offers Internet safety presentations to schools around the country.
• Schools can also download this factsheet (PDF) from CISA on the threats inherent to remote learning.

Add Social Media and Cyber Safety to Your Curriculum

Schools have the opportunity to help improve cybersecurity by educating students to be cyber smart from the start. By teaching students how to protect their own identities online, how to use social media platforms responsibly, and how to be more cyber secure as individuals – using passwords, 2FA, VPNs, and more – we can make sure the next generation stays one step ahead of hackers and cyber criminals.

Cyber.org offers this great video on social media safety that can help get you started, as well as this downloadable fact sheet (PDF).

Make Sure Your Cybersecurity Is Up to Speed in Your School

One of the best ways to ensure that your student data remains protected is to manage how personally identifiable information (PII) is shared. Lumen Touch’s Bright PASSPORT™ provides districts with a library of approved apps that have been properly vetted to meet the required security standards. Learn more.

Does Your School Need a Cybersecurity Audit?

In order to begin making improvements to your cybersecurity strategy, you need to know where your weaknesses are. That’s why Lumen Touch is offering a brand new service for schools: Bright LITE™.  Our customized service offering provides individuals and organizations with the information and education to efficiently evaluate both the risks and opportunities they face. 

To learn more about how Lumen Touch can help your school remain cyber secure, get in touch.