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Health & Fitness

New Opportunities for Our Students and Teachers!

While schools were closed Tuesday, our technical team and outside consultants were hard at work installing and configuring our new computers!

On Election Day, when students were home from school and parents were casting a vote for the candidates of their choice, our technical team and outside consultants were hard at work installing and configuring the computers recently leased by the district.  The new labs in each elementary school are now fully functional, and students have started to use them immediately for a variety of learning activities.

At Felix Festa on Tuesday afternoon, I spent some time registering and connecting many Google Chromebooks, side by side with ace technician Frank Brooks and ELA teacher Amber Klebanoff.  These new devices, thirteen of which were dedicated by the Clarkstown Education Foundation, are likely to be transformational in the middle school and will be featured in some of my upcoming blog posts. 

The technical deployment team also descended on Birchwood School, installing and configuring forty computers to replace ones which had become outdated.  Principal Slaybough was there to catch some of the excitement and energy, and most of the computers will be ready for students when they return to class on Wednesday. 

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Lastly, Wednesday will also be a new beginning at South High School, where computers in the Auto CAD lab are being replaced with more capable technology, as are the outdated computers in the library media center and several other mini labs. 

In the next two weeks, many teachers in the district will receive a Dell netbook, used as a replacement for antiquated desktops in classrooms.  Classrooms equipped with SMART Board technology will receive updated computers--ones more properly matched to the processing power needed for this newer interactive technology.  North High School will be visited next week, with upgrades to labs and other areas, as well as near ubiquitous wireless access. 

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Though the new hardware is certainly a high point this week, conversations at Monday's monthly district technology meeting were equally exciting.  Informed conversations, based on earlier readings of journal and news articles, centered on the concept of "bring your own technology" to school, which would allow students and teachers to bring their own devices and connect to the internet (though not our servers) and take advantage of internet and cloud based resources.  Though we are not there just yet, after examining board of education policies and other process related elements, the committee is eager to recommend that such a practice become a part of our district's fabric. 

Additionally, the committee had extensive conversations related to moving from Microsoft Exchange to Google's Gmail for email.  Though there are considerations and preparations that need to be addressed, the goal is to move forward in this endeavor as a result of the strong instructional value it brings to the district, including the opportunitiy to offer student email (with granular access privileges) and a more seamless integration of the Google Apps suite of tools that have quickly been becoming a centerpeice of our district's technology tools. 

This week marks the beginning of what will be a banner year in the district, as measured by student engagement, collaborative opportunities, and access to real life tools that honor our commitment to providing students and teachers at CCSD with the best possible learning opportunities and the tools that support these efforts!  Exciting times indeed!

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