Ever wonder what it takes to build an online educational portal for 57,000 students? That is a task that Boston's chief information officer, Kim A. Rice, undertook. Rice, a former teacher, and later director of strategic planning for information services at the Massachusetts Department of Education, helped design the Mass Virtual Education Space, now called MassOne, for Boston's school system, according to a recent Edweek article. The first task in the IT overhaul was to refurbish computers that were two to three years old, replacing 1,300 outdated computers. Students now have access to a virtual hard drive to store files and discussion forums to safely chat about work assignments, because this private network is for students only – no strangers can access the network. Teachers can directly communicate with students about homework, projects and resources needed to get those projects completed. The network is also designed to help prevent online cheating -- students may not privately chat or share files within the network. One of the challenges has been hiring and retaining IT staff. Rice said that she is trying to hire people right out of college in the area to give young people a chance to work in a development or infrastructure environment. But maintaining staff is a continuing challenge. One way Rice is trying to deal with this is to recruit more women into the field, hoping to pull girls interested in math and technology into IT. Her experience teaching fourth grade brings her teaching skills, and now those as a data architect to improve Boston's school system. “Our schools are moving in powerful directions in trying to be that community that extends itself to the home. I’d really like to see our technology utilization in five years be such that it’s not thought of as technology as much as it’s thought of as a way to connect to the world and a way to continue learning,” Rice said in the article. Pretty cool, huh? What's happening in your city or town that might help students?