The Internet failure this morning throughout Palo Alto Unified School District threw off schedules and plans for students and teachers throughout Palo Alto.

Palo Alto High School economics teacher Debbie Whitson was one of many teachers affected by the incident.

“We put in orders to print our tests yesterday,” Whitson said. “But when she [the woman who makes copies] got here there was no internet, so she never received the emails so she didn’t have our request for tests.”

According to Whitson, the copier is connected to a network for which a code is necessary, so they were not able to make the needed copies. Just before the test, fellow economics teacher Eric Bloom came to the rescue.

“He doesn’t have a second period [class],” Whitson said.  “So he used the fax machine at the front office to make a few copies, then used the library copier to copy off the tests.”

The test was taken and the students did not experience any hassle from the incident, according to Whitson.

“We started with the free response… and then Mr. Bloom showed up about 20 minutes later with the rest of the tests,” she explained.

All that came of it was a bit of stress for the teachers, according to Whitson, but there are other ways a similar problem could be solved in the future.

“It would be nice if we could override the network necessity for the copy machine,” Whitson said. “The copy machine works, we have the paper, so if we could do that we could make copies in an emergency.”

The Internet is now restored throughout the district.

The Paly Voice is currently investigating the cause of the Internet failure.  Check back soon for further updates.

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