Teachers, you make things happen. Pitsco is so appreciative of all you do to positively impact learners. They are here to cheer you on and assist with funding more opportunities for your students.

• The Pitsco Educator Grant is open to preK-college educators in traditional classrooms, out-of-school settings, and homeschool.
  Applications are accepted from the first day of each month to the last day of the month (for example, the January grant application period is January 1-31).
• One $350 grant will be awarded each month at the discretion of Pitsco Education in the form of a Pitsco voucher, not redeemable for cash.
• The selected educator will be contacted via email and/or phone to confirm acceptance of the grant.
• The $350 value can be applied across multiple transactions until the total is depleted to $0.
• An educator may be awarded only one $350 grant during a 12-month period.
• At a later date, Pitsco will ask each winner to share their experience using the products purchased with the grant.

Contact your dedicated Account Manager:

Erica Lopez-Negrete Smith
Illinois Sales
800-835-0686
elopez@pitsco.com

Learn More About Pitsco Education

Social-emotional learning (SEL) has gained wide attention in today’s classrooms, and several schools have devoted as much as 10% of their time toward teaching these skills. Fortunately, relationship-building is a key component in SEL instruction—and there are certain things educators can do to maximize this advantage and use SEL time to get to know their learners.

Administrators can support their teachers by making sure they have access to appropriate resources (e.g., texts that are culturally relevant and include SEL themes) and training in student-centered SEL instruction. Even if you don’t have access to Newsela’s SEL Collection, your teachers can still use Newsela content to support social-emotional learning.

Contact your dedicated Account Manager:

General inquiries: iltpp@newsela.com 

New Newsela Schools or Districts
Jenny Pearl
Illinois Partnerships
847-691-1019
Jenny.Pearl@newsela.com

Current Newsela Partners
Nicky Dunlap
Illinois Partnerships
773-495-0703
Nicky.Dunlap@newsela.com

Learn More About Newsela

Putting together a cybersecurity strategy is a lot like growing onions. If it doesn’t have layers, you’re probably doing it wrong.

Of course, we’re talking about multi-layered cybersecurity. With more school districts taking a renewed interest in data protection, many are looking high and low for new ways to keep student privacy safe. Luckily, that’s exactly what a layered approach to cybersecurity is all about.

In this blog, we’ll explain the basics of multi-layered protection and why your school district stands to gain from an additional layer of cloud security.

WHAT IS MULTI-LAYERED CYBERSECURITY?

A multi-layered cybersecurity strategy uses multiple layers of defense to protect sensitive data from potential threats, such as malware, ransomware, or a phishing attack.

Each layer provides a different level of protection, fulfilling its own specific data security function. These multiple layers work in combination to create a comprehensive and effective cybersecurity posture.

By taking a layered approach, you can protect the entire attack surface from unauthorized access or exposure. In simpler terms, it allows you to cover all the bases simultaneously.

HOW DOES MULTI-LAYERED SECURITY WORK?

If you want to understand the value of multi-layered threat protection, it’s best to put it into context.

According to Forbes, a traditional security strategy generally involves designing a defensive perimeter around your most sensitive data. Preventative tactics like this are crucial to safeguarding assets from conventional attack vectors, but tend not to account for internal threats like an accidental leak.

A layered approach works more proactively. It implements various types of data security controls at different levels of your IT infrastructure. For example, multi-layered cybersecurity could include firewalls, data loss prevention tools, endpoint security, or access controls. Because each layer is designed to detect and prevent different types of threats, they work together to create a holistic security framework.

Notably, this multi-layered approach is similar to “defense in depth,” a strategy that also uses multiple layers of controls to mitigate cyber threats. However, a defense-in-depth strategy typically focuses security operations on a single layer of the infrastructure (e.g., the device or network), whereas multi-layered security focuses on the entire technology stack.

As the cost of education continues to increase, those tasked with paying for educational costs have continued to feel the strain. Cutting costs without hurting the quality of the educational services may feel impossible given the importance of providing the best possible educational experience for students.

But there are areas where schools and districts can improve efficiency in spending and take steps to reduce costs and maximize the effectiveness of each dollar spent without sacrificing the quality of education. Of course, developing creative money-saving ideas in budgeting and teaching methodologies can save some cash, but they can only extend so far.

How can schools save money?

Money-saving strategies go hand-in-hand with schools just as much as pencils, blackboards, and desks. There are any number of areas where school funding can be wasted, and it takes organization and discipline to help school districts save money. Energy costs, supplies, facility maintenance, transportation, food service, and employee salaries are just a few areas where  schools must devote a constant flow of cash.

Learning where and how schools can save money is a good first step, but implementing cost-saving measures can be a major challenge. School operations teams struggle across the board. Equipping your organization with the right mindset, tools, and resources to enact a savings plan is often the difference between a successful, optimized savings plan and a frustrating experience.

These 10 strategies for cutting costs allow you to ensure your school budget is under control and costs are kept low without sacrificing your school operations quality.