Peak Uptime Plugs Education Into The Future

The Skiatook Public School District in Skiatook, Okla. is working with local solution provider Peak Uptime to finish its latest technology project: bring a SMART Board interactive whiteboard to every classroom.

The school district, which totals four schools serving a growing student population of more than 2,400, currently uses about 600 whitebox desktop PCs and four whitebox servers from Peak Uptime.

Peak Uptime, Tulsa, Okla., which is currently building two new servers for the district, has also helped implement a video surveillance system and an automated system for checking visitors' IDs and backgrounds. Skiatook is in better shape in terms of technology than most districts because of decisions made about eight years ago, said Steve Williams, assistant superintendent of Skiatook Public Schools. "Our superintendent told the staff that we're going to get on this ship, and it's leaving the dock," Williams said.

The district now has at least one computer lab in each of its schools, as well as three to five PCs in each classroom for student use. The district completely replenishes one of the labs each year.

The focus on technology spreads beyond the classroom. The district recently opened a fully computerized, 5,200-seat arena, Williams said. It has also integrated its video surveillance cameras into its network and installed LobbyGuard Visitor Management Systems devices to screen visitors to the schools.

Travis Flake, manager of Peak Uptime's education solutions, said technology has had a strong impact on both the Skiatook school district and on the community. "A former school president with ties to AT&T managed to get a fibre connection to the school, which has allowed the entire community to get high-speed Internet," he said.

Peak Uptime is currently involved in getting a SMART Board interactive whiteboard in every classroom in the Skiatook district.

Peak Uptime provides the SMART Board, along with an NEC projector and a custom-built desktop PC. The PC can project Web-based material through the projector on the screen, where teachers and students can use electronic pens to make notes or solve problems. Anything on-screen can then be printed as needed.

Joyce Jech, principal of the Marrs Elementary School, said her school's students love to use the SMART Boards for such subjects as math, reading, social studies and science.

Karen Smith, a second grade teacher at the school, has had a SMART Board in her classroom since October. Smith said she can use it to project a page from her textbook that is downloaded from the Internet onto the screen, and let kids work out the problem in front of the class using electronic pens.

The SMART Board project started a couple years ago when the district's superintendent saw the product at a convention, Williams said.

"He liked it, bought a few and threw them out there," he said. "So now most of our elementary school classrooms have them, and there are several in our middle school and high school."

With the acquisition of ConXts, Peak Uptime instantly got about a 20 percent share of Oklahoma's education market in the kindergarten through 12th grade segment, said Rolf Strasheim, director of client solutions at Peak Uptime.

Williams said the time is quickly coming when everyone will carry a laptop, and it is important for schools to be ready.

"The day of the paper tablet is going," he said. "There was a time when people resisted pencil and paper because they thought it was a big waste of paper. Then when pens replaced pencils, people said it was a waste of ink."

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