Dinwiddie County Public Schools has been recognized by the Southside Virginia Regional Technology Consortium as a state model for educational technology. In the fall of 2008 our School Division won the state SVRTC Technology Award. This credit belongs to the leadership of our technology team, led by Timothy Ampy and our educational technology staff for supporting technology on many different levels and for utilizing E-Rate funding to place Dinwiddie County Public Schools in an elite group of school divisions (Top 4% in Virginia). The most recent effort approved by the Board of Education is to advance Dinwiddie County's technology capability light years ahead by upgrading Dinwiddie Schools to fiber-optic cable to deliver our telecommunications needs (underwritten by state and federal financial resources). The shift to fiber-optic will enable us to run our internet and telecommunication systems with a Gigabit WAN system, or to put this in more simplistic terms our internet will not only increase capacity but will run over 600 times faster than the present T-1 lines that serve us can.
This is great news for our schools with over 2,200 computers and an aggressive on-line testing and instructional program. Computer speed has increased dramatically since the advent of the networks most school divisions have employed, and with web-based software accounting for most of the major functions of schools nationwide, the upgrade to fiber optic will enable schools to meet the demands of the new digital age. Our student information system is currently being upgraded to Infinite Campus, a product that is anticipated to be heavily used by both staff and parents on a daily basis. Faster internet connections will not only unclog some of the typical traffic jams encountered by all faculty and staff at peak usage times, but also provide teachers with more web-based teaching opportunities for students overall.
"This upgrade will allow for new and expanded curriculum technologies to be introduced and will enhance all of our programs K-12," said Christie Clarke, Coordinator of Instructional Technology. Every teacher in Dinwiddie County operates a laptop computer and a multitude of instructional needs are addressed through advanced technologies in our school division. There are a variety of new initiatives underway at Dinwiddie County Public Schools: Digital Conversion of paper student records; Upgrade of the current student information system to Infinite Campus; Upgrade of the Library system to Desitiny; Addition of Trip Tracker to the online transportation system; Upgrade of KeyStone for Human Resources and Finance Departments; Software upgrade Division-Wide to Office 2007; addition of new Digital Reader to help imporve student reading skills; E-Office Point-of-Sale food service system; Replacement of all school-based file servers; Replacement of all elementary school computer labs; Addition of at least two wireless carts to each school; Replacement of all routers and PIX Firewall; Addition of IEP Online development for the Special Education staff; Addition of web filter proxies at each school; and Network Digital copiers added division-wide.
As Superintendent of Schools I could not be more pleased with the advancement of technology to enhance and enable student learning. We are entering a period of time when schools nationwide must rethink the delivery system of educational services to students and community members, and the new technologies available to us at this time will require a solid infrastructure and technology backbone to advance our capabilities. We envision schools that soon will look considerably different than our 20th century counterparts and technology is the promise of a vastly different future for citizens of the 21st century. Those citizens are occupying seats in today's classrooms across America, and will be the driving force for the changes that will propel us into the 22nd century. It should be a fun ride.
