Dierdre:

     I empathize with your position. It does seem kind of a good way
     to expand your career potentials to become really familiar in a
     hands-on way with educational technology. On the other hand,
     unless you really plan on becoming a techie, I would be very
     cautious about taking on the responsibilities of a LAN manager.

     That stuff can be kind of fun for about a minute, and then you
     just have headache after headache. Particularly if your LAN is
     now being used to support "mission critical" apps like the
     business office and development, where down time is essentially
     unacceptable, and destructive system crashes are *really*
     unacceptable (oops, I lost the general ledger, or the membership
     mailing list, or whatever), YOU DON"T WANT TO BE THERE!

     There are lots of consultants with whom you can "outsource" the
     management of your institutional LAN. Let them be the ones who
     are on the phone list for midnight system crashes, or wearing a
     beeper for instantaneous complaint. I spec'ed, installed, and
     maintained a LAN in a small museum (using LANTASTIC), and the
     sense of freedom that I felt when I changed jobs and that was no
     longer my problem were genuinely palpable

     If you are the LAN manager, are you also the tech support for
     computer problems? Whether or not that is part of the original
     job description, it is often how things shake down, since system
     problems are often attributable to LAN problems. And that is just
     maintaining the LAN as it now is. It sounds as though your admin
     has big desires to expand applications, no doubt to being WWW
     consumers if not providers, and email. Oy is this alot of work!

     And then you're talking about integrating MAC's into the system
     as well? That is a whole other level of problems.

     Unless you really want to add these kind of techie skills to your
     resume, or unless there is a substantial (and much-needed) pay
     increment involved in taking on these responsibilities, I would
     be *very* cautious about this "opportunity."

     Finally, its important to differentiate between being the person
     who will spearhead "new-media/new-technology" efforts (which is
     exciting), and being the person who will manage the LAN (which
     isn't).  I say, go for door number one, and leave door number 2
     to someone who makes a living at that kind of thing.

     Of course, strictly personal opinion based upon personal
     experience. YMMV.

     Eric Siegel
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