All Heritage teachers recently received new computers to replace the outdated technology they had previously been using. It was a drawn-out process, but by February 5th, the new tech had been distributed to all departments.
Ms. Anna Stiles, Heritage’s computer support technician, was the one behind the entire technology update. “I would put out 25 computers and go through them to make sure they had the software they need,” Stiles recounts. “I separated it by department and day, morning and afternoon, just to get a good schedule down and hopefully have it feel adaptable to teachers, too, because no one’s workday is the same here.” Stiles further explains, “We built a survey allowing teachers to tell me specifically what they needed, because no teacher teaches the same. I wanted to make sure that I was getting the technology that allows them to teach in the beautiful, unique way that they do.”
Most teachers had Lenovo Thinkpads which were 6 years older than the current generation of laptop. “Generally speaking,” says Stiles, “we try not to push over 4 to 5 years for a technology refresh.” Due to COVID, technology improvements were stalled district-wide. Stiles inputs that the new generation of computer that teachers have been provided is the L13 Yoga, which is able to handle much more in terms of software. “[Teachers] having the technology they need is the best part of my job,” she says.
“Every single teacher in this building received an updated computer,” states Stiles, “including our paraprofessionals, who up to this point have been using Chromebooks, which is not the most ideal as those are fairly student-based… To me, it was a passion point to make sure that every single person in this building that handles students and education has what they need to support that. No one was left out of this.”
Ms. Sarah Selden, English teacher and Newspaper sponsor, received a personalized new laptop this month. Her previous laptop “couldn’t be updated to work with the current internet anymore,” and its lack of adaptability and software compatibility greatly hindered her teaching ability. The new L13 Yoga “works with the internet and it holds a charge for a lot longer. What was really wonderful was that our tech person, Stiles, was able to collect all our requests for different software that we needed and personalize the computers to our needs. As the Newspaper sponsor, I now have InDesign and Photoshop on my laptop, which is great because I can quickly fix things as needed. From my upstairs classroom, I won’t always have to run down and get one of the Apple computers to slowly open up.”
“[Ms. Stiles] staggered the release based on how much she needed to put on the computers beforehand,” Selden states, “but I think everyone should have them now, and it’s been a great change.”
It is not only the English department and paraprofessionals who have developed a growing need for updated technology over recent years. “The science teachers and the physics teachers need very specific graphing apps that need to be loaded onto these computers,” Stiles comments. With the new technology, there is something for every teacher. “We’re giving teachers the software specifically that they need to do their best work,” Stiles assures.