Dragon Zone: ‘There is an app for that’

By Ethan Ball

Our generation of students are engulfed in technology. From walking down the halls with our eyes glued to the screen to lying in bed for hours on your cell phone, it’s no secret that these devices have a prominent role in our lives.

As of this month, Apple has approved Hutchinson Community Colleges’ application to put DragonZone on the App Store.

“We published the Android app last August to the Google Play Store,” said Loren Morris, chief information officer at HCC.

“We had the app written at the same time, and we started publishing to the stores at the same time; it just took several months longer to do on the Apple Store.

“We had to go through several legal steps in order to get the app where Apple would even look at it, for security purposes,” Morris said.

As of now, the app automatically logs you out upon exiting for security purposes.

“We didn’t want to open that up to folks. Long term, we may look at a different mobile credentialing system … so there’s this security vs. convenience question, and right now we’re faulting on security.”

“The Dragon Zone App uses a lot of the same features and functionality of the DragonZone portal,” Morris said.

Dragon Zone allows students to communicate with teachers and other students and check their to-do list of assignments. They can even check what assignments are coming up in future class sessions.

“I use it to check for assignments and any messages from my teachers,” said Madison Schrock, Buhler.

“I use it to check my grades and emails,” said Kayla Surver, Hutchinson.

“I used it a lot last semester for my history class,” said Kaitlynn Golden, McPherson. “Every class session we would have a one-and-a-half-hour PowerPoint lecture, and there was so much information to cover. I could wake up in the morning before class, grab my cell phone, and immediatly start studying.”

The message seems to be this: Make your life easier and download the DragonZone app.

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