New technician proves a necessity
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The hardest part of his job is constantly working to fix problems “I guess you could say that the entirety of my job is involved when things aren’t working the way that they’re supposed to,” compute tech Matt Fish said. After working at the Lawrence Public Schools for a little over four years, He learned what computer problems happen most amongst students and after a while he saw the same problems and was able to identify the problem quicker.
“As you can imagine, with tech, there are issues that happen all the time,” Everett said. “If he wasn’t here, we would be in trouble.” Before being hired by USD497, Fish studied at Johnson County Community College, and then worked for various websites, warehouses and a couple of other schools. “I had some friends that had a position like this,” Fish said. “They recommended it as well.” Although Fish works in a school, no educational background was required for the job, but he did have to learn certain safety procedures that could be used in the case of a student emergency. “There are certain trainings regarding CPR and what to do if someone’s bleeding that most people do for public schools,” Fish said. “Those kinds of things that are required from HR, they do that at the time that you’re hired.” With coursework becoming more and more paperless each year, having an in-school computer technician has become more essential. Both students and staff seem to be thankful for his presence in the building for any issues that could emerge. “He’s definitely has to be at the high school level,” Everett said. “It was very smart of the district to have tech help housed in the buildings.”
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f there’s one staff member throughout all of school that every student has visited at least once, it would probably be our resident computer technician, Matt Fish. Fish has been a building technician for a little over four years, who recently set up shop in a small corner of the new library reserved just for him. Students are welcome to come to him at any time for issues with printing, misplaced passwords or computer viruses. Anything that can go wrong with a computer, Fish can usually fix. “The entirety of my job is involved when things aren’t working the way that they’re supposed to,” Fish said. “You really get started by having to figure things out for yourself, because generally when problems happen, they’re happening for the first time.” Junior Rose Morland visits him about once a week with computer problems. “My computer’s just always malfunctioning,” Morland said. “I come to him with all my computer problems and he usually fixes them with a positive attitude.” Others seem to agree with how much Fish has benefitted the school. Library media assistant Chris Everett works with Fish in the library, and sends students to see him if they need help with computer issues.
Bird’s Word
Gone Fishing
page by Emma Milburn story by Suzanna Ingram photos by Delaney Rockers
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