VIP Tone, Inc. a leading solution provider to K-12 education, today announced that the San Mateo County Office of Education (SMCOE) has deployed a customized version of the CEEDS Enterprise Portal for use by all school staff and students in the Hillsborough City School District. The Hillsborough deployment is the first in San Mateo County where as many as 8 more districts are expected to begin to use the Portal over the next several months.
The CEEDS Enterprise portal is an open-source Portal Platform based on JA-SIG's uPortal technology (www.ja-sig.org). The CEEDS Enterprise Portal is pre-integrated with VIP PASS™ a state-of-the-art, commercially licensed and supported, identity management and automated provisioning software technology. This technology integrates with student information, human resource, and other enterprise data systems to manage secure role-based access to multiple applications. Now all software and content services purchased by the district can be made available in one location using single sign-on credentials through the CEEDS Portal.
"As SMCOE's technology partner, we are pleased to see the successful approach they have taken to implement the CEEDS Platform within their districts," said Robert Iskander, Founder & CEO of VIP Tone, Inc. "With careful planning and professional development for key staff at the district level, they progressively introduced additional applications throughout the school year, with more planned for the fall semester. The SMCOE Portal can now provide access to at least 10 unique applications, with the ability to roll-out many more pre-integrated solutions that are readily available through the EduTone Xchange infrastructure supported by VIP Tone."
"San Mateo County Office of Education has invested in purchasing many applications that provide educational content to teachers and students including video streaming libraries, encyclopedias, library research databases, teaching resources, databases of learning objects, news, and course management systems", said Steve Kindel, Director of Educational Technology and Media Services at the San Mateo County Office of Education, and a Board Member of the Consortium for Educational Enterprise Data Systems (CEEDS). "The Portal has been a very successful way to ensure that these applications are being used as part of the day to day teaching and learning tools in Hillsborough and has helped us negotiate preferential pricing by aggregating purchases of content applications for larger populations while targeting the best instructional resources to specific groups of users. By enabling the Portal to manage these licenses, the district is lowering its licensing costs for these applications."
Over the next twelve months, the San Mateo County Office of Education will expand the Portal to make it accessible to students and ultimately parents. The intelligence of the VIP PASS technology will provide teachers with convenient yet secure access to powerful teaching tools and data; students with a safe and collaborative anytime/anywhere educational environment; and parents with access to their children's educational information, such as homework, schedules, and attendance information, all available online through any web-enabled device from home or school.
About VIP Tone, Inc.
VIP Tone, Inc. provides a unique data integration, knowledge management, and convergence platform for the global education market. VIP Tone's School MATRIX® Platform is a key enabler in addressing the K-12 education market's two highest priorities: measuring and benchmarking of student achievement and improving school accountability. The VIP Convergence Platform integrates various networks for communications, computing, and information, into a single, remotely and securely managed IP-based network. VIP Tone's wholly owned Australian subsidiary, VIP Tone Australia PTY, Ltd., based in Adelaide, South Australia, is the market leader in Australia, with a client base consisting of the majority of the Australian State Departments of Education. VIP Tone is a privately held company headquartered in Alameda, California. For more information, visit the VIP Tone web site at www.viptone.com.
About The San Mateo County Office of Education
The San Mateo County Office of Education (SMCOE) is committed to ensuring and improving the quality of learning and achievement for all students in San Mateo County by providing exemplary leadership and innovative, effective programs and services which enable local districts and the County Office to educate students to succeed. For more information, visit the SMCOE web site at www.smcoe.k12.ca.us
About the Consortium for Educational Enterprise Data Systems (CEEDS)
The Consortium for Educational Enterprise Data Systems (CEEDS) is a non-profit, Joint Powers Association consisting of a group of California County Offices of Education. By pooling expertise and resources throughout the State, CEEDS facilitates regional and statewide cooperation and enables a governance structure for the purchase, development, and delivery of technologies that facilitate school improvement. For more information, visit the CEEDS web site at www.ceeds.org.