BIT 110728

BUILD INSTRUCTOR TRAINING 7/28/11

In attendance:

Nate, Jeffrey, Sean E, Alan, Gordon, Steve, Max, John, Jason, Blaine, Keith, Amelia, Meredith

Conclusion from introductions:

It's the rest of the world that's quirky, we're the normal ones.

How do we organize our thoughts around volunteer management in Build?

We did the following exercise, and this is the feedback that people gave:

• My favorite thing about instructing volunteers in Build is:

• • The variety of people
  • Seeing the light come on
  • Answering technical questions and showing people how to do things
  • Working with weird systems
  • Getting to do something new
  • Figuring out how to answer particular questions for particular different kinds of people
  • Teaching people how to diagnose
  • Bringing technical concepts to people who are deeply non-technical (analogizing)
  • Demystifying the computer
  • Learning from Builders about what they want to accomplish
  • Recruiting people into Post-Build
  • Waking the kids (and their parents!) up to the possibility that they can be builders

• My least favorite thing about instructing volunteers in Build is:

• • Running the Build room with only one person when it's busy
  • Lack of resources
  • Volunteers who are just here to get in, get a computer and get out (and are rushing)
    • Possibility of upping the number that people build before taking one home
    • These “client-volunteers” are doing really important work for us and spreading the word when they leave
  • Lack of clarity on the goals for Build instructors
  • Trying to help folks know when they can get a build credit for a Rejected system
  • Equipment shortages
  • Especially when it's one little cosmetic thing, like an I/O shield or hard drive caddy
  • How can we make sure this is being reinforced in System Eval?
  • leaning solutions & gunk removers
  • Tools that migrate
  • Machines that are incorrectly categorized in the warehouse
  • Better signage/process for recycling & sorting in the Build room
  • Volunteers who are angry and/or irrational
  • Volunteers who don't take direction or constructive criticism
  • When long-term volunteers stop showing up out of nowhere

Recap of last Build instructor training

• Encouraging peer-to-peer learning
• Encouraging volunteers to assist & orient new Builders (delegation)
• Facilitate troubleshooting techniques and skills
• Remind Builders that it's not about the knowledge that they have, it's about having the skills to troubleshoot and figure things out on their own
• Brainstorming about documentation and education
• Making Build accessible to a wider variety of people
• RAM policy
• Troubleshooting methods:
  • Asking questions to determine what they know
  • Simplifying (scientific method)
  • Utilize previous experience
• Minutes from previous Build instructor trainings are on the wiki now! See: http://wiki.freegeek.org/index.php/Build_Instructor_Trainings

Optical Drive Testing

Issues that have cropped up:

• Needing to install & use k3b when drive won't blank
• k3b has a similar bug in which it won't automatically unmount
• Build overflowing with incoming untested optical drives
• Volunteer frustration (estimated 3-4 times a shift)
• Need clear set of diagnostic tools that are easily accessible
• Not knowing whether drive or media is what's bad
  • Having a known good drive for comparison would help

Brainstorm of possible solutions

• Use “3 times and you're out” rule to determine when to recycle drive
• Using stickers rather than x-es?
• Moving optical drives that have failed into a different bin?
• Optical drive testing station in Build
• Potentially partnering with AT to test the ones that have failed twice

Commits from this discussion

1. Sean will send an e-mail with command line tips for seeing whether optical drives are working or not
2. Jason will look into updating the KVM

Laptop QCs

It's here! And it has its own documentation! This is on the wiki, linked to the main Build page.

• When printing, put it on different colored paper.
• Bring laptops back to Laptops for battery testing (which has its own station)
• Wireless: if Builder is not connected via ethernet cable, update manager will try to update software and not be able to (apt-get errors)
• On behalf of our bandwidth, please make sure that Builders are installing updates via the wired connection, not wireless. Everything will go much faster for everyone.
• Builder instructors should aspire to try to go through this documentation and process themselves so that they can be more comfortable teaching it to other volunteers.
• If we're out of laptops to QC in the TARDIS during a Build shift, feel free to go over to Laptops to see if they have any more lying about.
• Make sure to update the Keeper label, it tracks the progress of the build.
• Put printmes inside the laptop - there's no need to tape them.
• Some confusion coming from what's okay in terms of optical drive function and what needs to be recycled (and for desktop Build too!)

Infrastructure/Education

Troubleshooting guides are up on the wiki! Check out: http://wiki.freegeek.org/index.php/Build_Troubleshooting_Guide

Infrastructure

• Mounting monitors on the walls so that people of different heights can be more comfortable. Probably will begin with a few to start out with and see how people respond to them.
• Upper shelves also function as a place for useful stuff that isn't stored anywhere else
• New shelving unit is coming soon! This should help with optical drive storage.

Education “Learn More” packets – more in-depth than troubleshooting guides

Policy Documentation

Sean has been consolidating these on the wiki. See: http://wiki.freegeek.org/index.php/Category:Build_Policies