As you enter at present’s lecture rooms, it is clear: Expertise is not only a device, it is the driving power behind vibrant communities, shaping how college students study and academics join. Many college students have entry to expertise of their lecture rooms, however the true problem lies in harnessing sources successfully to reinforce studying and construct stronger, extra resilient communities. As faculties try to adapt to the calls for of the fashionable digital world, the main target has shifted past merely offering entry to gadgets towards leveraging expertise to reinforce educational strategies and foster significant engagement and connection to one another and their academics. Many colleges prioritize stakeholder collaboration within the strategy of assessing technological wants. By embracing a collaborative method, faculties and districts can be sure that the adoption of recent applied sciences aligns with the various wants and aspirations of scholars, academics and the broader neighborhood and that the imaginative and prescient is really shared, leading to a extra dynamic, interactive expertise.
Just lately, EdSurge spoke with Daniel Gauna, the manager director of knowledge expertise at El Segundo Unified Faculty District, California. Gauna has 16 years of expertise inside the district. Earlier than assuming his present position, Gauna labored as a marketing consultant for native faculty districts within the South Bay space, specializing in elements of expertise infrastructure similar to firewalls, routing and switching. Though his background is in expertise, his present position requires him to work intently with the Academic Companies group to help educational functions and different associated elements. Gauna strongly believes within the significance of engagement and collaboration in defining expertise wants and targets.
EdSurge: What’s your faculty district’s imaginative and prescient for expertise integration?
Gauna: Being a part of a small faculty district permits us to work extra straight with the neighborhood, notably regarding our path with expertise and educational strategies. We give attention to how we are able to help each our college students and workers in our imaginative and prescient.
The district purpose includes supporting each the expertise and educational sides. The secret’s to leverage our expertise in order that our college students see it as greater than only a machine of their fingers; it is about figuring out the best way to use these instruments successfully. This implies shifting from tech-dependent to tech-enabled.
We need to see expertise leveraged past the normal classroom method. We need to guarantee that college students are engaged with our academics and vice versa, that academics can interact with college students.
How did the district decide which applied sciences to undertake in alignment with its imaginative and prescient?
We concerned stakeholders. I all the time imagine in doing a proof of idea to make sure one thing matches into our infrastructure. Regardless of my community and safety background, I additionally view issues from a trainer’s perspective. I do know the significance of method, particularly for our academics. We sought change and enchancment in our classroom setup.
So, we examined a casting answer final yr. We concerned three academics from every faculty grade to evaluate its ease of use and educational advantages. The Vivi answer proved a lot simpler for us to roll out from a tech perspective, and on the academic aspect, it had extra instruments for our academics to make use of. Gathering suggestions beforehand made a clean transition to once we absolutely carried out it in the summertime.
As soon as adopted, how has expertise helped you to reinforce studying experiences and foster engagement and connection?
At El Segundo Unified Faculty District, as I discussed earlier, our focus and imaginative and prescient are that our lecture rooms are tech-enabled and never tech-dependent — leveraging expertise impactfully to reinforce our college students’ studying experiences total and construct further bridges between college students, academics, leaders and even content material.
Since we launched Vivi this fall, our elementary principal has began making morning bulletins utilizing its video streaming function throughout the entire faculty, generally studying books. This has turn into a spotlight for our academics, college students and even our central workplace workers, who tune in to start out their day with a smile.
Expertise can generally get a nasty rap as a result of individuals suppose college students are simply sitting on gadgets, however at El Segundo, college students use their gadgets to create, collaborate and share their work in participating methods. One in every of our academics shared how considered one of her non-verbal college students has taken a 180 [turn] due to having the ability to share his work wirelessly with Vivi. Earlier than this device got here into our lecture rooms, he actually was unable to share his voice. Now he can, and that’s the energy of expertise when it’s successfully paired with instruction.
See for your self how Vivi transforms communication, boosts classroom engagement and simplifies IT administration. Request a demo.
Over 2,000 faculties, 100,000 lecture rooms, and 500,000 college students and academics depend on Vivi for classroom engagement and campus-wide communication. Vivi’s wi-fi display sharing, digital signage, emergency alerts, and video and textual content announcement capabilities maintain college students and workers knowledgeable and engaged all through the varsity day. Study extra at Vivi.io.
