Parents can access an online grade system to monitor their child's school attendance, assignments and grades.
Gateway Regional High School students are shown here using school-supplied iPads for classroom work. Students using the iPad take a test in Cynthia Jensen's advanced biology class.
HUNTINGTON — Gateway Regional School District prides itself on being a technology enriched district where school administrators, teachers and School Committee encourages the use of technology in the classroom as well as at home.
It is a school district where most, if not all students are exposed to laptop computers and iPads each school day for classroom work, including taking notes and completing quizzes and exams. It is also a district that plans to keep moving forward in its expanded use of technology.
Schools superintendent David B. Hopson says the use of iPads in classrooms is “a multiple facet pilot program that will help district leaders determine which technology works best. We are also looking to netbooks and at other hand-held computers. He said the district took the technology route “because of the private sector where emphasis is on technology. If we are training students for the future we must have a technology base.”
Gateway Regional School District superintendent David Hopson
“What we are doing is just another method to get information. This is not the end,” Hopson said. The administration is “still getting mixed results on how many, staff and students, are using technology at home and how much in each classroom.” He said he “expects greater advancement in both within the next few years.”
Currently several high school classes have downloaded textbooks onto their iPads, including for such subjects as advanced biology, English as a Second Language and chemistry. Students find the iPad exceptional at notetaking as well as for quizzes and exams, Hopson said, so if the state decides to administer the Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System tests online, Gateway is prepared.
To make new technology accessible and affordable to students and their parents, the Gateway school district created it own nonprofit organization to provide a lease program that comes with insurance, full technological support and a carrying case for either the laptop or iPad.
MASS 1to1 was created in 2007 by former technology director Paul Facteau and Hopson. It now leases more than 800 laptops and 72 iPads to pupils from kindergarten through Grade 12, according to current technology director Angela T. Burke.
MASS 1to1 also provides similar programs to schools in the Hampshire Regional, Easthampton and Ashburnham-Westminster Regional school districts.
Students are assessed a monthly lease fee for the equipment “which softens the financial burden. When the lease is up, the student and parent owns it,” said Burke.
There are no other programs of the type in the state according to the Department of Education.
Schools in Burlington, Reading and Revere have begun integrating iPad technology into classrooms but no district provides assistance in leasing technology, said J.C. Considine, of the state Department of Elementary and Secondary Education.
Gateway advanced Biology teacher Cynthia Jensen uses a flexbook downloaded on the iPad for her students, and said the “challenge is to teach this way, using technology, not 100 percent. We must use this as a tool.”
But, the advantage for teacher, Jensen said, is that the flexbook for her biology lessons can easily be revised and adjusted “to meet the specific course of study.”
So, in addition to teaching her students advanced biology, she must also teach them new study skills and digital etiquette.
At Littleville Elementary School in Huntington, first-grade teacher Gail A. Gingras used iPads in conjunction with Smartboards in her classroom. And, with a school app, Gingras says she can monitor her pupils’ learning skills from their homes. “They work independently on the iPads. They cannot take them home but many families have one or a laptop and through the app I can monitor their work at home.”
First-graders in the Gateway district use iPads for reading and math now but soon will use them to write stories as well. “In class they can read stories, listen to stories and take quizzes on the iPad,” she said.
The district also offers parents access to an online grade system so they can monitor their youngsters’ attendance, assignments and grades.
In addition to computers in the library, the district has 120 iPads and about 400 laptops that are used throughout the district for classroom learning. There are 70 iPads in the high school that are used as alternatives to textbooks for science and English courses.
Jonathan T. Wyand, 16, of Huntington, has leased a MacBook laptop for the past three years and uses it in all classes for notes, projects and sport videos. He is a co-leader of the district technology crew and a founder of the Gator News Network.
“I might lease an iPad for use in the auditorium, and it will also be nice for notetaking,” he said.
Burke said the real benefit to the Mass 1to1 program is “the accessibility and if any problems develop, they get fixed right away or a loaner is provided. There is no deductible, no our of pocket expense.”
Burke also noted that “overtime, the technology program can reduce the school district’s cost for textbooks. The nice thing is textbooks on line are constantly updated.
“Our vision for down the road is to have students with backpacks that are not filled with books but a slim iPad or laptop,” she said.
Jenna Margarites, 14, of Russell, is shown here taking a test on her iPad in a biology class at Gateway Regional High School.
Jenna L. Margarites, 14, of Russell, said using the iPad in advanced biology class “is a lot easier that using a text book.” Actually she doesn’t even take textbooks home. Instead she takes a picture of the text pages assigned for homework and leaves the books in her locker.
“I use the iPad to take pictures of homework assignments, pages from the text book and as a result I believe I learn faster and easier,” she said. “Everything is a lot quicker, this is very helpful and when I do research, it is immediate. Everybody I know who has an iPad uses it this way.”
Gateway Regional High School freshman Brennan F. Foley, 15, of Middlefield, is on his second leased laptop. The first one has been passed to his younger brother, a sixth-grader.
“I have the iPad through biology class, and I use both for school work. I have a little problem getting used to the (iPad) keyboard so I can’t use it for note taking,” Foley explained. “I just copy and paste it to the app and then pick up on my laptop at home.
“This is a lot easier to study and I love them. The lease program is great. I feel so lucky to have it,” Foley said, explaining his first laptop was leased when he was in the fifth-grade.
Sarah M. Foley, Brennan’s mother, is a special education teacher at Munger Hill Elementary School in Westfield, a Westfield State University student and member of the Gateway Regional School Committee.
“Technology in the (Gateway) district has been expanding since Brennan was in the third-grade, and the move has made students very tech-savvy. It has enriched learning, and it is now available for all students,” she said.
Foley says she did her own homework in her role as parent to determine if the lease program was cost effective. “We went to the retail store to check prices and options. This program is nice because the district provides technical support on site right at the school,” she said. “These are quality tools. ”
As a member of the School Committee, Foley confirmed Hopson’s vision that the “district is headed towards finding more (text)books on the Internet.”