Proxy Server - bypassing, using, etc with Mac OS X

I'm now attending an international high school school in Rome, Italy. So far everything about the school seems great...except the internet and network.

I talked to the tech guy and found out this school has a proxy server running on all connections. The school is wired with ethernet jacks in most dorm rooms, and that's how I'm connected right now, though we're supposed to get wireless in a few days. This will also have the proxy server. He says that the purpose of this proxy server is so he can get a daily log of EVERYTHING that happened, something to the end of seeing what we're all up to (I HATE big brother things, even though I don't think I'd be doing anything against school policy; whole thing's just creepy and terribly annoying)

The proxy server has one open port: port 80 (http, of course). Is there anyway to make your computer mimic that of a computer that has all the ports open, i.e. a computer that accesses the internet without this damn proxy server?


Setting up my computer to work with the proxy server involved doing this:
• System Preferences --> Network --> Built-in Ethernet
•TCP/IP - Configure IPv4 "Manually"
IP Address: 131.0.0.48 (tech guy just keeps increasing the last number for each additional computer on the network)
Subnet Mask (no change): 255.255.255.0
And no other changes in this tab
•Proxies - Check first six proxy servers (FTP Proxy, Web Proxy etc) and don't check Automatic Proxy Configuratoin; on the right side of the window, enter FTP Proxy Server as 131.0.0.3 for all checked proxy servers and set the port to (you guessed id) port 80

Additionally, there are no passwords nor usernames/logins inolved during the entire proces


• Safari works fine (supposedly some sights are blocked).
• Apple Mail doesn't work at all and the tech guy says he doesn't know how to make it work. Is there any way I can get Mail to work?
• WoW sure doesn't work, and I doubt there's anyway to get it to, right?
• AIM and iChat do work (after changing a few hard-to-find settings), but I've been using adium, and changing its settings to use a proxy server don't seem to work. Is there any way to make adium work?

Essentially, the proxy server is extremely annoying, and I'm wondering if there's some workaround that can fix my problems. There's supposedly a program called Proxy Client (I believe that's what the tech guy said) that makes a PC mimic a computer without a proxy server for most intents and purposes

Additionally, the network kicks me off AIM/iChat approximately every (I kid you not) five minutes. But this is probably the internet connection itself being terrible, so I highly doubt there's anything on my end to fix this problem.

Proxies
Suck

Sorry for this long post, and any feedback at all would be greatly appreciated. Thanks guys!

edit: I just found out the port tunneling (HTTP port tunneling) might be the answer to some of these problems. I do have computers back at home on 1.5 Mbit DSL which I could use. But I can't seem to find any information that pertain to the Mac OS X platform, only Windows.

 

So yeah...I guess a multi-page post isn't the greatest of ideas. Anyways...

For any who may be intersted: I've been looking into my whole issue with a friend of mine who's back in my hometown. We're going to try to set up a VPN between my computer here in Italy and my computer back home. If this works, then it should be a relatively simple solution to the whole problem.

Any suggestions on a VPN client and server?