Students at St. Anthony’s School are being given a leg up in the technology race thanks to the new computer lab that school now boasts.
The previous school had only a few computers tucked at the back of the art classroom.
“Everybody’s enjoying them,” said Tammy Pascut, new media teacher at St. Anthony’s School. “Compared to laptops on carts, they’re loving it. We didn’t really have a computer lab at the old school.”
The new computers are equipped with the standard word processing programs, but really shine when it comes to media programs. Students can edit photos, make animations using flash, movies, and more.
One of the new features is the touch screen built into each monitor.
“They’re working really well, because the younger kids can touch the screens and make them work,” said vice principal Chris Bzdel.
“It’s nice to have a desktop lab area, you get the larger screens, they’re fast, and are compact, with an all in one design. The touch screen is a nice feature, it’s so much more intuitive,” said Vince Van Hyfe, assistant superintendent technology and planning. “Alberta Education is suggesting schools can move away from labs, but when you design new media programs, you need larger screens and extra horsepower a workstation provides.”
Each of the workstations runs on Windows 7 and cost roughly $600 each.
The computer lab is not the only thing getting a technological boost. Each classroom has a new smart board ready to teach our next generation.
“All our classrooms now have smart boards, which is a huge help. We can bring things up on the board right away. If there are any related videos or websites we can bring those up right away,” said Pascut.
“We put smart boards in every classroom, it’s a standard item to have now. Every classroom is basically a media centre,” said Van Hyfe.
The new computer lab and the smart boards are enabling students to broaden their horizons. Many are already working on producing short movies and animations and rarely miss an opportunity to take advantage of the new technology.
