Technology Update

Westsides+broadcast+studio+control+room.

Sharon Roberts

Westside’s broadcast studio control room.

The 2018-19 school is bringing technological updates to the Westside campus.

Replacing the existing laptops with some new, and more modern Hp tablets, students will have the luxury of a touchscreen and a more flexible device for their work.  The HP tablets are foldable and smaller than the ones we currently have, with a more innovative design. Teachers are already using the new tablets, while students get theirs in January.  The selling point is that they are faster and more efficient.

Exact dates for laptop turn in and tablet distribution have not been announced at the time of this publication.  Students are hoping it won’t interfere with finals, or projects, or worse, their winter break holidays.

SR
The newly installed professional quality TriCaster System

Over the summer, the Howler TV Studio got an upgrade.  Removing components that were as old as most students in the school, the entire control room was streamlined with professional industry standard equipment, featuring a TriCaster broadcast system. The Howler News Crew moved from second to the first period and will be broadcasting announcements first thing in the morning, from Chanel 4 on your classroom television.

The Howler News Crew have a new director as well.  With Ms. Delk leaving Westside, and Ms. Roberts creating the new Contemporary Media class, a new teacher for broadcast was needed.  Welcome, Mr. Javier Gusart to the scene.  He is a graduate of UofH, where he studied and degreed in Audio Visual Technology.  He is taking over Westside’s AVP classes, broadcast journalism, and the Lady Wolves Soccer team.

Almost all classes are equipped with Smart Boards and/or overhead projects, which allows teachers to teach creative and interactive lessons.  It didn’t take long for teachers to realize that their ease in using these tools was a bit more clunky.  A doggle with extensive cabling is now needed to plug in.

As the school year progresses we will check in with students to see what questions, problems or solutions they have encountered with the new technology.