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The $166,000 grant will accelerate the initiative and allow the school to distribute wireless devices throughout its schools. The initiative will see technology become a more important teaching tool, while making it more accessible in the classroom.
Through the grant, the district will purchase a cart of 30 devices for each grade from second through eighth. Each library will receive a cart, as will the middle school lab. Each of the English, social studies and world language departments at the high school will also be stocked.
John Krouskoff, a consultant with BOCES that has been working with the district for months, has recommended that the district enter a “three year replacement cycle” for Google Chromebooks, which will permit the use of digital textbooks while increasing access for students in the classroom.
An earlier grant that the district accepted has already supported professional development for more than 40 teachers that will be versed in how to most effectively utilize the new technology in and out of the classroom.
“The faculty and students are eager to bring the hardware and software into the school that are readily available in the outside world,” Krouskoff said during his technology presentation at the last Bronxville Board of Education meeting. “Whatever we do now will undoubtedly change with experience and innovation.”
Superintendent David Quattrone said that the district will transition from a “lab-centered” approach, where the devices are centrally located, to a “classroom-centered” approach, using universally utilized productivity tools rather than specialized software.
“This grant advances our work by at least a year,” Quattrone said. “It will touch every student in the school and give our teachers the resources we need to move forward.”
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