It's high (tech) school

By Rick Dandes
The Daily Item

March 19, 2008 05:30 am

— LEWISBURG -- One pair of juniors presented a project on radiology, and how images are used to treat illnesses.
Another collaborated on a documentary that used film clips and voice-overs to produce a 17-minute film on the horrors of nuclear war.
Technology -- and the students who use it -- were on display during Tuesday night's "Science and Classrooms for the Future" at Lewisburg Area High School.
"Look at what they've done," Principal David Himes said. "It's pretty clear that these students, many of whom are only a year or two away from going to college, are on their way to learning how to compete effectively in a global marketplace."I think that's one of the purposes of the CFF program," he said. "But it's also transforming the basics: how students learn and how teachers teach."
Classrooms for the Future, an initiative of Gov. Ed Rendell, envisions putting multimedia centers in every high school's English, math, science and social studies classrooms.
Those centers would include laptop computers for teachers and at every student's desk, as well as projectors, scanners, digital cameras and SMART boards -- which are large, projected computer screens that are responsive to touch.
The Classrooms for the Future program started at Lewisburg Area High in October. The excitement was almost instantaneous, Superintendent Mark D. DiRocco said.
"We have six CFF at the high school, two science classrooms, two mathematics classrooms, a language arts classroom and a social studies classroom," he said.
"Every student, grade nine through 12, will get into at least one of these classrooms. Every student has at least one class with the laptops available.
"The Internet has valuable information for teaching tools that you can connect directly to the SMART board and projector," said Van Wagner, who teaches environmental science and earth science.
Lewisburg Area High students believe that the Classrooms for the Future are beneficial to learning.
Seth Laino and Blake Lawson, both juniors, presented the radiology project.
"It's better because the laptops and SMART boards make it easier to take notes and understand the writing," Lawson said.
"It allows students to become more computer savvy by interacting hands-on with technology," Laino said.
Alex Ororbia and Scott Hyde worked on the nuclear war documentary. They started by using computers provided in their CFF science classroom.
"It only took us a week to do," said Hyde, who had a Mac at home and additional software to help produce the film.
Freshmen Nick Tischio and William Persing collaborated on a science project of testing tap water.
"We are here to help out," Tischio said from behind his Mac laptop.
"We like the idea of this particular project and demonstrating what is in our regular tap water," Persing said.
"The big difference I've seen in our students," Himes said, "is that they are actively involved in their learning. Their world is so much into using their cell phones and computers. They are used to that. Then they come to school and are often bored by traditional school practices. "

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