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Laptops win Daviess the PEAK Award
By Madelynn
Coldiron
Staff Writer
The Daviess County school board and staff have built a bridge over the
technology divide so that all the district’s high school students can
have the same technology resources. The bridge was built with wireless
laptop computers, which have been given to the 900 freshmen at the
system’s two high schools.
Crossing the technology barrier that separates children who have
computers from those who don’t has netted the district the fall PEAK
(Public Education Achieves in Kentucky) Award.
“Today’s kids …naturally incorporate technology into their daily
activities and they are more likely to be more interested and motivated
when the teaching and learning tools are relevant to their world,” said
Superintendent Tom Shelton, who led the committee that spearheaded the
project. “We believe this will increase student achievement.”
PEAK judge Diana Gross, a member of the Owsley County school board and
the KSBA Board of Directors, agreed. She called Daviess County’s
eLearning program, “An awesome feat for the district to achieve,” and
predicted, “This step will affect achievement for years into the
future.”
Board chairwoman Mary Tim Griffin, whose son took part in piloting the
program, said students have responded enthusiastically to the laptops
because, “they want instant information, and learning is no different.”
Griffin was recently volunteering at one of the district’s high schools
and watched students in the cafeteria, where, she said, “they were
sitting there eating and working on their laptops.”
In supporting the Daviess County nomination, Apollo High School English
teacher Melissa W. Ashby, who has been involved since the inception of
the pilot, pointed to several benefits of the laptop program:
· It motivates students because “their enthusiasm for learning increases
dramatically when we allow them to use that technology to explore,
create and problem-solve.”
· It empowers students by putting the Internet and all its research
capabilities at their fingertips. “Synthesis and evaluation, the higher
cognitive skills, are practiced much more often when the students ‘own’
their tools instead of occasionally accessing them in a lab situation,”
Ashby said.
· It empowers teachers, who also are equipped with laptops and
supportive resources and training to use them. This has changed the
methods for teaching content, which takes on “new life when taught
through the integration of technology,” she said.
· It makes the learning process more efficient – where students would
not have time to pursue a classroom question by going to the library,
they are able to quickly find answers with their laptops and share the
information with the class.
But one of Ashby’s students, Jonathon Nunley, said the most important
reason for the program is “learning to use technology in the modern era.
“We use technology in everything we do in this world. Over 90 percent of
jobs today use technology in some way. …These laptops are teaching us a
great deal about technology and technology concepts. I think this will
make all of the students with laptops stronger contenders in the work
force because they know how to use and apply technology to their jobs.”
Preparation
The district did its homework in preparing for the eLearning program. It
started with a pilot program for 160 students in 2003 that looked at
reliability and durability of laptops and adaptability for both home and
classroom use. The laptops were not leased for the 900 freshmen until
this year, after teachers had spent the intervening year training and
focusing on integrating technology into the classroom, said Shelton.
Students are allowed to take their laptops home.
The school board also prepared, by participating in workshops and
traveling to other school districts across the country that have similar
programs. The district’s PEAK nomination noted that, “Board members have
invested significant time in researching the benefits of technology in
the classroom and have concluded that moving in this direction is in the
best interest of our students…and those students’ futures.”
The school board also set an example by moving to a “paperless” board
meeting format with their own laptops, using KSBA’s eMeeting service.
Funding commitment
The cost of equipping 900 high school freshmen with laptop computers on
a four-year lease is about $450,000. Equipping all four classes will
cost $1.8 million. The district benefited from a one-time $230,000
federal grant for the first year, but is also kicking in general fund
money freed up when the state education department allowed districts to
shift capital outlay funds to offset maintenance and insurance expenses
in 2005-06. If the state continues to allow this flexibility and the
board continues approving the maximum property tax rate it can pass
without fear of recall, both high schools will be fully equipped by
2007-08. As students graduate, the laptops, which the district will own
after four years of payments, will become surplus property. Students
will be given an opportunity to buy them.
Shelton said the district’s education foundation will also raise money
for the program and he is hoping that other sources of grants and
donations will help sustain eLearning in the future.
The deadline for PEAK Award nominations for the spring cycle is March
16.
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