My suspicion is this is a budget decision.  I understand many schools are trying to cut costs and would not be too concerned in this case if it wasn’t for the $15-20 thousand dollars Odyssey will spend to send less than 20 students overseas for a week.  I personally think the board that approved this expenditure was unconscionable in this action as it took what should have been a good educational opportunity from the rest of the entire student body to benefit such a limited number of students.  This is exactly the type of poor decision making that gives charter schools a bad name.

Hopefully future Administrators and Board Members will reconsider such a terrible budget decision and provide opportunities for the entire student body rather than such a limited number of kids.  If not, I hope they are all voted out by parents that actually get a clue!

I recently experienced down time on a number of blogs hosted with them.  The first time I contacted technical support I was told 15 minutes.  It took about an hour for the server to come back up.

A few hours later the server was down again.  Here is what I was told -

you: any idea on when the sites will be up again?

Vlad Derevyanko: Sorry, but we have maintenance on database server. We are working on this now. ETA 3-4 hours.

3-4 hours?  I would expect any good quality hosting company to be better than this.  If you really care about your sites being up, dont go with these jokers.

When we started with Blockbuster years ago I thought it was a good value.  Our plan included 3 movies out at a time, 2 game rental coupons, and unlimited instore movie exchanges.  Almost all of that has changed and the price has increased.

The first change came with the discontinuing the instore game coupons.  Frustrating to our kids but not that big of a deal.  Next the monthly price increased and the number of instore exchanges changed from unlimited to a limit of 5.  Never a good thing when the price goes up and features go down.

Just recently Blockbuster announced the exchanging of a video at the store will not result in a new video being sent by mail until the store video is returned.  I consider this a major reduction in service. 

So why Netflix?  Over this same period of time Netflix has added streaming video that can be sent to any computer, networked video box, or xbox 360.  Initially this was limited to a certain number of hours a month.  About a year ago Netflix changed this to an unlimited amount of streaming video.  They actually increased their service but did not increase the monthly fee.

Blockbuster wait times for popular movies has also increased dramatically.  Netflix seems to purchase enough new releases that they can provide them without waits.

Blockbuster has been sneaky with fine print over the last couple of years so be careful if you choose Blockbuster as your movies by mail option.

An intelligent fan would want BYU to be thought of as nothing close to overrated.  The more legitimate BYU’s ranking as a top ten team, the greater the win for TCU.  If BYU was in fact overrated, then the win by TCU is reduced by such.

Chanting something like this especially in this case only gives the media additional reason to say the same thus reducing the chance TCU will get a big boost in the polls.

Maybe next time the TCU fans will actually think before speaking…. then again, based on experience, probably not.

I have noticed an interesting trend over the last few months.  Our numbers from Google Urchin are showing an increase in our traffic.  At times we will spike for a few days based on a advertising campaign or being featured somewhere.  While we may see a significant increase in our Urchin results, the Alexa results often drop.

Of the two, the Urchin results are much more trustworthy as they are based on actual visitors to the site.  Alexa is using data they acquire from other sources and do not have access to our actual visitors.

Based on our experience, I question how credible the Alexa information really is and thus how usefull.

We opened a commercial account with MStar almost a year ago on the iProvo fiber network.  MStar was professional and easy enough to deal with.  Over the past year I do not remember any major outages related to this fiber line.  We use the line for multiple websites and to administer a number of servers remotely.  As with any mission critical setups, we have a second line through another provider which has also been really good.  The second line acts as a backup as it is not as fast as our fiber line.

A few weeks ago Broadweave took over the iProvo network and our account from MStar.  Part of this required a complete change of our block of IP’s.  This was an inconvenience but something we understood.  To change all of our systems takes 3-4 man hours but we got it knocked out. 

So with that background, here is what has happened over the last few hours.  On the night of the 18th, our Broadweave line dropped.  I called their contact number and was told they had a major issue that was being worked on.  The next morning our systems were still down.  I called support again and finally we were able to resolve the problem. 

Total downtime around 12 hours.

At roughly 4 oclock on the 19th our line dropped again.  We went through all the same diagnosis they had run us through earlier that day and found that we were getting an error that the connecting IP they had assigned us was telling us it was already in use elsewhere on the network.  We called the support line only to get voicemail telling us they were still having problems but were working on it.

We continued to check the line and tried to call again on the 20th (today) around 12 noon.  Again all we get is voicemail.  I filled out the support form, left a voicemail, and called the Salt Lake support number and left a message.  As of 1 1/2 hours later I have had no response to any of those.

Total downtime on second drop 19 1/2 hours and still going.

Would I use Broadweave again?

Probably not.  I am concerned that they do not have any Saturday support for this type of issue.  If our other line drops, I get a response generally within 30 minutes and the problem is resolved within another 30.  My impression is Broadweave wants more commercial accounts but operates their support based on being a residential provider.

If we did not have a good backup option, Broadweave would have been an absolute nightmare in this case.  Even with the backup line, it has become considerably more inconvenient to admin some of our boxes remotely.    At least for now, I don’t think Broadweave has the infrastructure to handle business class connectivity.

Update -

I called the provo support line again around 4 pm and the phone was answered.  The rep told me they were working on the problem and had someone from their NOC call me back.  He asked me to test it and the line was back up.  For now, things are up and running again. 

A couple of things that would have been really helpful here. 

First it would be have been great to receive a phone call or email back letting me know someone actually was aware of the contact.  I know this is 60 seconds that could be used to fix the problem but at least I would know they received one of the alerts I sent them. 

Second, it would also be nice to receive some type of alert when they have fixed the problem.  Another 60 second email or phone call would have been great and would provide a significant amount of goodwill regarding the problem.

I think most business owners know there are going to be problems along the way.  I have found how you handle the bump makes all the difference in the world with fair customers (the crazy ones won’t be happy no matter what you do).  I try to give companies a fair opportunity to solve the problem and try to be understanding in cases where the issue is beyond their control.

I will post a follow up in the next few weeks.  Hopefully it will be one of rock solid stability and up time. 

While the rooms are called Villas, the setup is much more like a Marriott Hotel with Suites.  The property has 9 floors with a hall lined with rooms on either side.  The size of the rooms was great and the fully stocked kitchen made it easy to eat meals in the room if desired.  The beds were comfortable and there were plenty of extra pillows and blankets.  The master bathtub was huge and each room had a TV and DVD player.

The activity center called the “Maze” provided a number of activities for kids and adults alike.  Many of the activities were complementary while others had a minimal cost to cover the items (things like a shirt, blanket, etc.).

Underground parking was provided onsite for one vehicle with overflow parking offsite for additional vehicles.  The parking garage was secure and we never had an issue finding a parking space.  There were multiple elevators accessing the garage so it was easy to quickly get to a room.

Our rooms itself was comfortable but had a few issues.  The air conditioner in one room was very loud while in another room hardly put out any air.  The door lock handles to the master bathroom did not lock and at times there was a lot of noise as other guests arrived, departed, or just visited outside their room.

Park City in general is fairly expensive.  Activities at Park City Resort include the Alpine Slide ($11 a ride), the Alpine Coaster ($18 a ride), the zip line ($19 a ride), and the chair lift ($18 for an all day pass).  An all day pass is available for all rides for $60.  For our family, to go on the Alpine Slide and Alpine Coaster including drivers and passengers was $88.  Not an inexpensive activity.  While our kids enjoyed the Alpine Slide, the Alpine Coaster was by far their favorite.

As part of the Alpine Slide you get a ride on the chairlift.  One way to get more value out of the cost of the Alpine Slide is to ride the chairlift to the top and spend some time hiking back down to the point where the Alpine Slide starts.  We asked the staff if this would be OK and they did not have any problem with it.

It was a fairly good hike from the top down to the point of the slide start but there were multiple trail options ranging from gradual to steep.

Overall it is a nice resort but not one we will likely stay in again.  We enjoyed the pool, Maze activities, full kitchen, and available stainless steel gas grills in the pool area.  The lack of inexpensive activities and the amount of noise in the rooms though would be enough for us to look elsewhere in the future.

China seems so intent on making the Olympics memorable, morals have been thrown out the window.

The two instances at the opening ceremonies are not really that big of a deal though ask Milli Vanilli what people think of fake lip sync.  The substitute singer has milli vanilli written all over it.

The fake fireworks are almost laughable that they would care enough to go to that effort.

What about gymnastics though.  To cheat by putting underage girls into the competition and covering it up at a government level speaks volumes about China’s willingness to cheat.  I think most (Chinese government excluded) feel like the Chinese should lose their gold in gymanstics.  It stands to reason that if they had gymnasts 16 or over that could have won the gold, they would have had to enter underage girls.

It will be interesting to see what else they defraud us with over the next few days.  Hopefully this is the end of the cheating.

We recently picked up a game called Boom Blox for the Nintendo Wii.  It was designed in part by Steven Spielberg with the story that he wanted a game he could play with his kids.

The game is a lot of fun and requires both thinking and motor skills.  Our kids from 5 to 10 all find it fun to play.  We added it about the same time as Mario Kart Wii and have found some of our kids and many of their friends prefer Boom Blox over Mario Kart.

It has been my observation that under the direction of Mr. Nyman Brooks, some very siginificant negitive changes occurred at the school.  First, the original vision of Odyssey included logic and ethics as part of the curriculum.  Mr. Brooks removed both subjects from the schedule.  It seemed being more focused on testing well and adding subjects such as Latin became more of a focus.  As a result, it seemed Odyssey moved much more to a conventional curriculum that you could find at any local school.  At Odyssey though you have the inconvenience of transporting your kids to a distant campus and the volunteer hour commitment.

Odyssey became much more of a liberal arts school but never did very well even at that.  Odyssey often seemed like a new business that was so caught up with whims of change it never really defined itself.  Rather than changing management to fit the “product”, management was constantly trying to change the “product” to fit their style.  This is very rarely a successful direction.  Every year a new curriculum was introduced.  When it would not work rather than questioning the abilities of the Administration, it was always blamed on the curriculum itself.

With Mr. Brooks departure, the Board has an opportunity to find a Director that is more considerate of the original vision of the school as well as capable of handling the  curriculum.  They would do well to find a Director that is a good communicator and holds his staff to an appropriate level of professionalism as well.  Hopefully they will be able to take advantage of this opportunity.

I think Odyssey has some real challenges beyond a new Director facing them.  The location of the campus and the rise in gas prices make it more expensive for parents to enroll students.  This coupled with the time it takes to get students to the school and the volunteer hour commitment all reduce the likelihood parents will enroll their kids.

The Board in a recent letter stated Odyssey is fully enrolled for the first time in it history.  I believe this was a deceptive statement.  Very much a smoke in mirrors statement.  Odyssey may be fully enrolled in the sense that it has filled up to the capacity allowed by the Charter.  All grades are not fully enrolled though.  If you broke enrollment down by grade the 7th and 8th grade still are not fully enrolled.  Enrollment is skewed towards the lower grades.  For instance there was an additional 15 student kindergarten bubble class added.

The claim is that with ECRI, it doesn’t matter if you add an additional 15 3rd graders as they will be placed in classes according to their level on a subject.  So you may have 3rd grade students mixed with 2nd grades, 4th graders, etc.  The reality is, if you have a Junior High aged student, they will still be one of only a few kids that age.  Additionally, with ECRI, their teachers will be generalists versus subject experts so they may not get the same quality instruction they would elsewhere.

In fact, the Junior High math and PE teacher that was phenomenal just left to take a job at another school because of this change.  This teacher, and Founder, also pulled her kids from the school to take them elsewhere based on her concerns with what was taking place at Odyssey.

I think the past Director and some current Board members have put Odyssey at risk of failure.  It is my hope they can make the necessary course corrections before the ship sinks.  Original Founders continue to leave based on the issues currently being faced at the school.