Spotlight on our staff - Anthony Keen

IT Manager

2006 - Present

“… and it’ll be great if you could start ASAP”, said the voice at the end of the line. More than a bit bewildered at the call I just received, given that the clock had told me, brightly, that it was 2am, I mumbled something down the phone and went back to sleep. Judy Crowe had just offered me the position of IT Manager at Melbourne Girls’ College, giving me four weeks to remove myself from my current employment and prepare myself for the new position.

My job at the time was looking after eight primary schools on the Mornington Peninsula, each of them allocated some hours per week for their “Specialist Technician” and after six years doing that, it was hard to say goodbye. After a whirlwind day showing my replacement all of my eight schools, I was satisfied and started my first day at MGC.

MGC runs a very complicated computer network that encompasses 75 wireless points, 50 printers, 40 servers, 1300 student BYOD laptops, 100 staff laptops, 300 desktop computers for staff and student use and a STEAM setup that has robots and 3D printers. We’re getting into Virtual Reality, Drone flying and 3D Motion Capture. Technology stops for no one.

Internet usage at the College gulps down about 200 gigs a day or about 1 TB of data each week. The school has received, at last check, about 970,000 emails that were blocked as spam, with a total of 4.9 million delivered in total over the past five years.

Every room has a projector or a TV, we use Google Docs, Microsoft Office 365, Cloud and Intranet systems, and we allow any kind of device to be hooked up. This isn’t common in a school system as forcing all students to use the same device is easier on IT and the teacher but disadvantages the family providing them and besides, students may want to use Apple or Microsoft, iPad or Android, it’s all the same to us.

There is a perception that many Computer Technicians hide from those who seek them, almost as if they don’t want to be found, but that is a concept I’ve never understood. We’ve tried to change that perception at MGC, by locating the IT Office in a central place, the library. We offer services that encourage everyone to see us, such as charging your phone, fixing your home laptop, giving advice about the latest gadgets and recovering those files that were deleted by accident. Plus, our service fees are modest, and all we ask from students is to provide a joke in payment. No, you can’t google the joke… come on!

From the moment Judy offered me the position, I’ve felt very lucky to have spent much of my career at MGC, helping the College to use Information Technology.  I look forward to embracing the next breakthrough in technology that allows staff and students to experience the possibilities of IT.