Tag Archives: G Suite

Google for Nonprofits adds new countries and G Suite discounts

With the spread of coronavirus, nonprofits need access to tools to help them work remotely and raise awareness online. To serve the unique needs of the nonprofit community, the Google for Nonprofits team is expanding the program to new countries and offering discounts for nonprofits who use G Suite Business and Enterprise editions.

Reaching nonprofits in more countries

In the program’s first expansion in years, we’re bringing Google for Nonprofits to 6 new countries—Portugal, Greece, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, and Peru. Google for Nonprofits is now available in 57 countries, helping thousands ofeligible organizations get access to Google’s nonprofit tools and continue business operations amid COVID-19.

Nonprofits can activate G Suite for Nonprofits at no cost and collaborate online with apps like Gmail, Docs, and Calendar. In addition, advanced features of Google Meetare available to all editions of G Suite through September 30, 2020. To help organizations raise awareness online, the Ad Grants Crisis Response Program is extending Ad Grants, up to $10,000 worth of text-based Search ads at no cost, in these countries through October 2020. The YouTube Nonprofit Program and Google Earth and Maps also offer nonprofits storytelling tools to amplify their cause.

Discounting G Suite Business and Enterprise editions for nonprofits

Many nonprofits are learning how to transition their staff and programs to online-only formats, and with that comes challenges around cloud storage, security and virtual collaboration. To give nonprofits access to G Suite’s advanced features, we’re launching nonprofit discounts globally for G Suite Business ($4 per user per month, normally offered at $12) and G Suite Enterprise ($8 per user per month, normally offered at $25). As always, G Suite for Nonprofits will continue to be offered at no charge.

G Suite Business for Nonprofits offers 1 TB storage per user, access to Google Vault for data management, video conferencing for up to 150 people, along with more security and administrative options. With G Suite Enterprise for Nonprofits, organizations have all the features of G Suite Business and G Suite for Nonprofits, with the addition of email encryption, live streaming and video conferencing for up to 250 people, as well as Cloud Identity to manage users and apps.

Google for Nonprofits is on a mission to empower nonprofits with technology. See our full list of COVID-19 resources on the Google for Nonprofits website, Coronavirus Resources page. Subscribe to our YouTube channel to get notifications for upcoming live streams and to learn more about our products.

Source: Google for Nonprofits

Google for Nonprofits adds new countries and G Suite discounts

Reaching nonprofits in more countries

Discounting G Suite Business and Enterprise editions for nonprofits

Source: The Official Google Blog

New Meet features to improve distance learning

Our team has been so inspired by the remarkable work of educators and school leaders around the world, who continue to adapt as schools shift to remote learning. Today, 120 million students and educators are using G Suite for Education worldwide to create, collaborate and communicate despite school closures. With this increase in usage, one consistent theme we’ve heard is that educators are looking for ways to continue teaching and collaborating in a virtual environment that is safe and secure. We’re sharing some ways we’re making Google Meet, a core service of G Suite for Education, work even betterfor schools.

Extension of access to premium Google Meet features

In order to support ongoing institutional needs, we've extended access to premium Meet features at no cost for all G Suite for Education and G Suite Enterprise for Education users until September 30, 2020. This means you can have meetings for up to 250 participants per call, live streams for up to 100,000 viewers within your domain, and record meetings and save them to Google Drive.

Better together: Using Google Meet inside Classroom

More than 100 million students and educators worldwide are now using Classroom. To make it easier to have classes remotely, we’re integrating Classroom and Meet, putting both tools in one place.

Educators can create a unique Meet link for each class, which is displayed on the Classroom Stream and Classwork pages. The link acts as a dedicated meeting space for each class, making it easy for both teachers and students to join.

The Meet links created by the Classroom integration are nicknamed meetings. For education users, participants can’t rejoin nicknamed meetings once the final participant has left, unless they have meeting creation privileges to start a new meeting. This means if the instructor is the last person to leave a nicknamed meeting, students can’t join again until an instructor restarts the nicknamed meeting.

To use this integration, school administrators need to turn on Meet for their domain. Administrators can grant meeting creationprivileges to individuals or groups, and we recommend that you assign creation privileges to the organizational units (OUs) that contain your faculty and staff members, which means that students will only be able to join meetings created by faculty or staff.

How Google Meet keeps your video conferences protected

With Meet, institutions can take advantage of the same secure-by-design infrastructure, built-in protection, and global network that Google uses to secure your information. Meet includes protections to safeguard student and educator privacy, including:

Meet adheres to IETF security standards for Datagram Transport Layer Security (DTLS) and Secure Real-time Transport Protocol (SRTP).
In Meet, all data is encrypted in transit by default between the client and Google for video meetings on a web browser, on the Android and iOS apps, and in meeting rooms with Google meeting room hardware.
Each Meeting ID is 10 characters long, with 25 characters in the set, so it’s difficult to make an unauthorized attempt to join the meeting by guessing the ID.
To limit the attack surface and eliminate the need to push out frequent security patches, Meet works entirely in your browser. This means we do not require or ask for any plugins or software to be installed if you use Chrome, Firefox, Safari, or Microsoft Edge. On mobile, we recommend that you install the Meet app.
Supporting compliance requirements around regulations including COPPA, FERPA, GDPR, and HIPAA.

For tips and best practices for admins on securely deploying Meet to your education domain, visit the Meet security and privacy for education page.

New Google Meet features to help educators keep meetings safe

We're rolling out additional features today to all G Suite for Education and G Suite Enterprise for Education users to give educators control over their meetings, making them more secure:

Only meeting creators and calendar owners can mute or remove other participants. This ensures that instructors can't be removed or muted by student participants.
Only meeting creators and calendar owners can approve requests to join made by participants outside of the school’s domain. This means that students can’t allow external participants to join via video and that external participants can’t join before the instructor.
Meeting participants can’t rejoin nicknamed meetings once the final participant has left. This means if the instructor is the last person to leave a nicknamed meeting, students can’t join again until an instructor restarts the nicknamed meeting.

For educators wanting to learn more about Meet and how to use it with their students, we recommend checking out Teach From Home, a hub for distance learning resources.

Source: The Official Google Blog

Accessibility ideas for distance learning during COVID-19

The massive shift towards distance learning presents many challenges for students, educators and guardians alike. But supporting students who have disabilities or require a hands-on approach in the classroom is an even greater challenge. Educators around the world are putting in long days to find creative ways to support all students in this new setting, especially students with disabilities. Here are some tips on using accessibility features to support all learners.

To help students stay organized and get work done

Distance learning has made it tougher for all students to pay attention and manage their time, and this can be especially hard for students with executive functioning challenges. These tools can hopefully help.

Use Calendar reminders to help students remember deadlines, and view due dates in the class Calendar in Google Classroom.
Encourage students to organize their assignments in Google Classroom or Google Keep, or in Google Drive.
Suggest students use Chromebooks in full-screen mode when working on assignments to minimize distractions.
Students can use Virtual Desks on Chromebooks or the Dualless Chrome extension for students who may benefit from seeing multiple Chrome windows on a single Chromebook monitor. For example, students can view a video lesson on one side of the screen, and a written assignment on the other side.
To help students manage their time, use the Stopwatch & Timer Chrome extension to create large on-screen timers.
Break up lessons into shorter parts, which can be beneficial for students with attention challenges.
Instead of doing video calls with the whole class, consider breaking the class into smaller groups, where each group meets one or two times per week. Prioritize 1:1 video calls for students who need it most.
For students used to working alongside teaching aides in class, you can create a Google Doc in which students can ask questions and get help in real time from their tutors, family members or support staff.

To help students and parents create a space for learning

Now that many of us are doing everything from home—teaching, learning, playing, and working—finding time for it all can be challenging. But it’s important to help students, especially those with learning challenges, carve out space and time to focus on schoolwork.

Dedicate a space (even if it’s small) for learning time only. If possible, avoid spaces near windows, open doors, or noisy areas of homes.
Suggest that students with attention challenges sit on swivel chairs, if available, to let off some energy. Fidget toys like spinners can also help students focus during lessons.
For students using text-to-speech tools, headphones can be helpful, especially if they’re listening during a video class with other students.

To ensure your lessons are accessible

Many Google tools have accessibility functions built in:

If you’re using G Suite for Education, you can enable captioning in Meet or in Slides. Captions can be helpful for students who are Deaf or have hearing loss, or those learning English—but also students in a noisy home environment.
Record your presentations in Meet or tools like Screencast-O-Matic or Screencastify for students to watch on their own as homework. This can help you make the most of live lessons, when you want to encourage as much interaction as possible.
Learn from your peers who are sharing stories with Google about engaging students through distance learning. Visit the COVID-19 distance learning resource page and Teach from Home for help.

To learn more and watch some tutorials, watch these videos, our G Suite accessibility user guide or join a Google Group. And find more on the Teacher Center, YouTube, and the Chromebook App Hub. Now is an important time to learn from each other—if you have other ideas, we encourage you to share them via this Google Form to help educators around the world benefit from your experience.

Helping teachers keep teaching

As billions of students are out of school due to COVID-19, we're sharing resources, product features and strategies to help teachers keep teaching.

View all 8 articles

Source: The Official Google Blog

5 tips for effective distance learning during school closures

For the foreseeable future, most teachers will be teaching in front of a screen instead of a classroom. For educators who are new to distance learning, it can be challenging to know where to start. So we asked our Certified Innovators, a passionate community of Google for Education experts transforming education across the world, to share their best practices and strategies.

Continue live teaching online

Marcello Baroni, high school, teacher of graphic design, Scuola d'Arte A. Fantoni Bergamo Italy

With schools closed, our whole school has been conducting distance lessons with Google Meet. That’s 650 students, 22 classes, 30 teachers, 20 tutors, and coordinators all connected virtually, so learning isn’t disrupted. We’ll be using Meet in the future to keep all students connected, wherever they are.

Teachers and students are also finding Google Classroom helpful to stay connected and engaged. Here are tips for using Classroom during periods of high demand. And to avoid connectivity issues, consider pre-recording lessons and posting to Classroom, or use the livestream feature in Google Meet.

Create digital office hours

Michael Kaufman, Tech Integration Coach, American School Foundation of Guadalajara

Digital office hours are a great way to ensure remote students still get one-on-one support from their teachers. I use Google Calendar and Hangouts Meet to create digital office hours. The two tools together make it easy to organize your hours and create a space for live interaction between the teacher and students in a distance learning situation.

Here is my YouTube video that guides you through creating digital office hours with Hangouts Meet and Google Calendar.

Use offline features to support students with limited or no home internet access

Mykel Williams, 7th Grade Math, Baldwin County Alabama

Even if students have limited or no internet access at home, remote learning can be done using offline features for Chromebooks. Our students can still access Drive offline and they can download video lectures from Google Classroom to watch later if they don’t have internet at home.

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Build a digital learning hub

Kyle Pace, Director of Technology, Grain Valley Schools

Using Google Sites—a simple website building tool—you can build a central hub for resources, important updates, and reminders can help students stay organized and keep parents and guardians in the loop, too. Students can also use Sites to create digital portfolios and share their work with teachers, guardians, and peers. Our teachers do a fantastic job of using Google Sites to keep parents and students up-to-date throughout the school year. Each team has its own dedicated site with important information and reminders, which helps learning stay on track.

Want to get started with Sites? Check out this tutorial.

Provide one-on-one guidance remotely

Abbey Sarault, 9th Grade biology and medical detectives, Abington

If a student is absent, has trouble accessing the internet, or even just needs a refresher on how to do something, videos can be a huge help, especially when students can download and replay them. With the Screencastify extension, it’s easy to record your screen and share the video with students directly in Classroom. You can also use videos to explain new tools and approaches to help students get the hang of distance learning. Here’s how I used ScreenCastify to guide absent students through an assignment.

Teach from Home is our resource to help teachers who are teaching remotely. For more distance learning tips and information, follow along on Twitter and Facebook. If you have tips for supporting remote students, share them with us here. And if you’re just getting started using remote learning tools, check out the Teacher Center, where you can find 101 trainings and lots more.

Source: The Official Google Blog

Chromebook accessibility tools for distance learning

Around the world, 1.5 billion students are now adjusting to learning from home. For students with disabilities, this adjustment is even more difficult without hands-on classroom instruction and support from teachers and learning specialists.

For educators and families using Chromebooks, there are a variety of built-in accessibility features to customize students’ learning experience and make them even more helpful. We’ve put together a list of some of these tools to explore as you navigate at-home learning for students with disabilities.

Supporting students who are low vision

To help students see screens more easily, you can find instructions for locating and turning on several Chromebook accessibility features in this Chromebook Help article. Here are a few examples of things you can try, based on students’ needs:

Increase the size of the cursor, or increase text size for better visibility.
Add ahighlighted circle around the cursor when moving the mouse, text caret when typing, or keyboard-focused item when tabbing. These colorful rings appear when the items are in motion to draw greater visual focus, and then fade away.
For students with light sensitivity or eye strain, you can turn on high-contrast mode to invert colors across the Chromebook (or add this Chrome extension for web browsing in high contrast).
Increase the size of browser or app content, or make everything on the screen—including app icons and Chrome tabs—larger for greater visibility.
For higher levels of zoom, try thefullscreen or docked magnifiers in Chromebook accessibility settings. The fullscreen magnifier zooms the entire screen, whereas the docked magnifier makes the top one-third of the screen a magnified area. Learn more in this Chromebook magnification tutorial.

Helping students read and understand text

Features that read text out loud can be useful for students with visual impairments, learning and processing challenges, or even students learning a new language.

Select-to-speak lets students hear the text they choose on-screen spoken out loud, with word-by-word visual highlighting for better audio and visual connection.
With Chromevox, the built-in screen reader for Chromebooks, students can navigate around the Chromebook interface using audio spoken feedback or braille. To hear whatever text is under the cursor, turn on Speak text under the mouse in ChromeVox options. This is most beneficial for students who have significant vision loss.
Add the Read&Write Chrome extension from Texthelp for spelling and grammar checks, talking and picture dictionaries, text-to-speech and additional reading and writing supports- all in one easy to use toolbar.
For students with dyslexia, try the OpenDyslexic Font Chrome extension to replace web page fonts with a more readable font. Or use the BeeLine Reader Chrome extension to color-code text to reduce eye strain and help students better track from one line of text to the next. You can also use the Thomas Jockin font in Google Docs, Sheets and Slides.

Guiding students with writing challenges or mobility impairments

Students can continue to develop writing skills while they’re learning from home.

Students can use their voice to enter text by enabling dictation in Chromebook accessibility settings, which works in edit fields across the device. If dictating longer assignments, students can also use voice typing in Google Docs to access a rich set of editing and formatting voice commands. Dictating writing assignments can also be very helpful for students who get a little stuck and want to get thoughts flowing by speaking instead of typing.
Students with mobility impairments can use features like the on-screen keyboard to type using a mouse or pointer device, or automatic clicks to hover over items to click or scroll.
Try the Co:Writer Chrome extension for word prediction and completion, as well as excellent grammar help. Don Johnston is offering free access to this and other eLearning tools. Districts, schools, and education practitioners can submit a request for access.

How to get started with Chromebook accessibility tools

We just shared a 12-part video series with training for G Suite and Chromebook Accessibility features made by teachers for teachers. These videos highlight teachers’ experience using these features in the classroom, as well as what type of diverse learner specific features benefit. For more, you can watch these videos from the Google team, read our G Suite accessibility user guide, or join a Google Group to ask questions and get real time answers. To find great accessibility apps and ideas on how to use them, check out the Chromebook App Hub, and for training, head to the Teacher Center.

We’re also eager to hear your ideas—leave your thoughts in this Google Form and help educators benefit from your experience.

Source: The Official Google Blog

Google Cloud for Student Developers: Accessing G Suite REST APIs

Posted by Wesley Chun (@wescpy), Developer Advocate, Google Cloud

Recently, we introduced the "Google Cloud for Student Developers" video series to encourage students majoring in STEM fields to gain development experience using industry APIs (application programming interfaces) for career readiness. That first episode provided an overview of the G Suite developer landscape while this episode dives deeper, introducing G Suite's HTTP-based RESTful APIs, starting with Google Drive.

The first code sample has a corresponding codelab (a self-paced, hands-on tutorial) where you can build a simple Python script that displays the first 100 files or folders in your Google Drive. The codelab helps student (and professional) developers...

Realize it is something that they can accomplish
Learn how to create this solution without many lines of code
See what’s possible with Google Cloud APIs

While everyone is familiar with using Google Drive and its web interface, many more doors are opened when you can code Google Drive. Check this blog post and video for a more comprehensive code walkthrough as well as access the code at its open source repository. What may surprise readers is that the entire app can be boiled down to just these 3-4 lines of code (everything else is either boilerplate or security):

    DRIVE = discovery.build('drive', 'v3', http=creds.authorize(Http()))
    files = DRIVE.files().list().execute().get('files', [])
    for f in files:
        print(f['name'], f['mimeType'])

Once an "API service endpoint" to Google Drive is successfully created, calling the list() method in Drive's files() collection is all that's needed. By default, files().list() returns the first 100 files/folders—you can set the pageSize parameter for a different amount returned.

The video provides additional ideas of what else is possible by showing you examples of using the Google Docs, Sheets, and Slides APIs, and those APIs will be accessed in a way similar to what you saw for Drive earlier. You'll also hear about what resources are available for each API, such as documentation, code samples, and links to support pages.

If you wish to further explore coding with G Suite REST APIs, check out some additional videos for the Drive, Sheets, Gmail, Calendar, and Slides APIs. Stay tuned for the next episode which highlights the higher-level Google Apps Script developer platform.

We look forward to seeing what you build with Google Cloud!

Source: Google Developers Blog

Make “work from home” work for you

In my job at Google, I advise people on how to use their time as efficiently as possible. When working from home, my productivity strategies are even more important because I don’t have the ordinary structure of a day at the office, like commuting to work, walking to meetings, or running into coworkers. When your house becomes your office, you need to learn a whole new routine.

Getting work done when your teammates aren’t physically with you has been the norm at Google for a while (in fact 39 percent of meetings at Google involve employees from two or more cities). But it might not be for everyone, and many people around the world are now finding themselves in new work situations. So I put together some of my go-to productivity tips—no matter where you’re working—and a few things I’ve learned about how to get it all done from home.

Designate your “spot” where you work (and where you don’t)

It’s easy to pull your computer up to your kitchen table or plop on the couch and start working. But a consistent room, spot, desk or chair that you “go to” every day to work helps your brain associate that spot (smells, sights and sounds) with getting work done. Put up some things you had at your desk, like pictures of your friends or family. Get a new mousepad you love. Stock your go-to snacks on a little shelf. And just as important as creating your "work spot" is determining the areas where you don’t work. Maybe you never bring your computer upstairs or into your bedroom. This helps create mental distance and allows you to relax often even though your work is at home with you.

Use Hangouts Meet like a pro.

You’ll probably be spending more time on video chat—in our case, Hangouts Meet. Here are a few tricks for Meet at home: lower your video quality when you’re experiencing bandwidth restrictions or delays, dial into a video call but get audio through your phone, andcaption your meetings to make sure everyone can follow. If you’re needing some (virtual) human interaction, set up an agenda-less video chat with your team or friends in the office—it’s not a formal meeting, just time to chat and check in with each other.

Practice “one tab working.”

If you don’t have a large monitor or your usual screen setup at home, it’s even more important to focus on one Chrome tab at a time. If you’re on a video call from your laptop, minimize all other tabs and focus on the conversation—just like you would put away your phone or close your laptop in a meeting to stay engaged.

Act the part.

Resist the urge to wake up and start working in bed—it doesn’t help your brain get in the “mood” of being productive. Stick to your usual routines like waking up, getting dressed, eating breakfast, then “commuting” to your new work space. Staying in your pajamas, while comfortable, will make you feel less like it’s a regular workday and make it harder to get things done.

Play around with your schedule and energy.

The good news about working from home? No commute. Think of this as a time to experiment with alternate schedules and finding your “biological prime time.” If you’re a morning person, try waking up and working on something for a bit, then taking a break mid-morning. If you’re a night owl who prefers to sleep a little later, shift your schedule to get more work done in the later afternoon when you may have been commuting home. Productivity is not just about what you’re doing, but more importantly when you’re doing it.

Working from home does not mean working all the time.

One of the hardest things about working from home is setting boundaries. Leave your computer in your workspace and only work when you’re in that spot. Pick a time when you’re “done for the day” by setting working hours in Google Calendar to remind people when you’re available. Take mental breaks the way you would in the office—instead of walking to a meeting, walk outside or call a friend.

Create your daily to-do list the day before.

Part of staying on track and setting a work schedule at home is listing out what you have to do in a day. I created a daily plan template (you can use it too!) that helps me create an hour-by-hour plan of what I intend to do. If you fill it out the night before, you’ll wake up in the mindset of what you need to do that day.

Finish that one thing you’ve been meaning to do.

Working in the office can be go-go-go and rarely leaves alone time or downtime to get things done. Working from home is a chance to catch up on some of your individual to-do’s—-finish those expenses, brainstorm that long term project or read the article you bookmarked forever ago. Set up an ongoing list in Google Keep and refer back to it when you have pockets of downtime.

Cut yourself (and others) some slack

Some people only have a one bedroom studio and are spending their days there. Some people have spouses who are working from home, kids at home, or dogs at home (I have all three!). Connectivity might be slower and there might be some barking in the background, but just remember everyone is doing their best to make working from home work for them.