District shoots for large screens in every classroom

By the beginning of the 2010-2011 school year, most classrooms in St. Charles Parish will have a large-screen device, whether it is an LCD projector, a flat panel monitor or a Promethean Board.

Colleen Charles, director of instructional technology for the schools, said that the goal is to have a device installed in each classroom that teaches a core subject throughout the school district.

“It’s really become important to the teachers to have these display devices. The software’s already there – this will enhance that because the teachers will be able to use the software to display on the screen,” Charles said. “This will be a major project for us for the months of June and July.”

The school district has slowly been adding the large-screen devices over the past years, but this summer’s project will be the final push to finish.

“This has been part of our long-range strategic action plan for years. Funding is well above our annual budget, though, so we’ve slowly chipped away at it,” Charles said. “In order for us to do it as one big item and get it done with, the School Board voted last year to give us a line item in the budget…to go ahead and do this project.”

To complete the project, the schools will need to add 199 devices to the 603 that are already currently installed at schools across the parish.

The additional devices will cost about $550,000.

“If it wasn’t for our Board and them making this a priority and devoting funds to it…we wouldn’t get there,” said Stephanie Steib, director of information technology for the schools. “It’s because of them that this project is going to finally happen. This is going to really enhance group instruction.”

Along with the new devices, teachers will undergo professional development training on how to effectively use the devices to enhance instruction, Charles said.

When the project is complete, each core subject classroom for all grades will have a large-screen device, all math classes for grades 4 through 12 will have a Promethean Board, and all kindergarten classes will have flat-screen monitors.