There are a couple of ways to achieve what you want but you shoud consider using Mandatory Profiles.
It has a couple of benefits.
Lower bandwidth and the Profiles will stay the same size. You could creat a seperate Profile for Staff and Students. I have given an example of how to create a mandatory profile below.
Logon as the Local Administrator to perform these tasks
How to create a custom default user profile
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/319974
http://www.petri.co.il/copy_user_profiles_in_windows_xp.htm
We had what is known as a (SOE) Standard Operating Environment. Each and every System had the same Software installed. A Teacher could move a class to another room if there was a problem with the original and Students could keep working.
To create a mandatory profile. Create a folder on the file server in your profile folder called ProfNT.Man
Create a standard user account on the file server. This is your template. You could call it Prep or Root. Point it to the ProfNT.Man folder for the profile.
Logon to a workstation as the new user and set it up as you want it for your users. When you are happy with what you want log off and then log back on to double check.
Log off and go to the file server.
1. On the server ,Start "regedt32".
2. From the "Window' menu choose "HKEY_USERS".
3. Next, select"Registry" from the menu and then "Load Hive".
4. Browse and select the ntuser.dat from the folder called ProfNT.Man.
5. Enter "suser" as the name for the key.
6. Highlight "suser" in the pane on the left.
7. From the "Security" menu choose"Permissions".
8. Give "Everyone" Full Control and tick "REplace Permissions on Existing Subkeys".
9. Click OK.
10. Once completed, ensure "suser" is highlighted and choose "Unload Hive" from the "REgistry Menu".
Close regedt32.
Navigate to the ProfNT.Man folder and rename ntuser.dat to ntuser.man
Direct your new users to the ProfNT.Man folder for their profiles.
Create a mandatory user profile
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc786301.aspx
How to assign a mandatory user profile in Windows XP
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/307800
Slow Logon
Make sure that DNS is set up properly on your Server and it points to itself, and also make sure that the Client is looking for the Server, for it's primary DNS.
