Imagine traveling to Australia to see the Great Barrier Reef without ever leaving the classroom. Imagine connecting with students around the globe without the need for a passport. Students in the Rialto Unified School District don’t have to imagine. It’s reality. Through the work of AVI-SPL, the California-based district has completely revolutionized its communication system and transformed teaching and learning with video technology.
The middle school’s new communication system consists of a custom Cisco T3 TelePresence system that allows for virtual field trips and a digital signage network that provides district communications. The idea for the project was conceived by Joseph Martinez, Board of Education clerk. His goal was to engage students and to reignite enthusiasm for learning.
“Rialto was about 20-25 years behind the times technology-wise,” says Martinez. “My vision was to get video and use video throughout our campuses.”
Martinez noticed that students seemed to be most engaged when interfacing with a computer or interacting with some type of technology. He had heard of schools in Virginia and Chicago who had tried videoconferencing with great success and thought it would be a good fit for Rialto. In addition, the district was looking for a way to conduct more efficient interdistrict communications.
“They were really looking at two initiatives. One to get communications out to the public and within the school. Then the other initiative was to build out some videoconferencing capabilities,” says JD Jones, director of Digital Media Solutions for AVI-SPL.
AVI-SPL installed a custom Cisco T3 TelePresence system in a room located within the middle school library. The TelePresence system uses Cisco’s Enterprise Content Delivery System to scale and retrieve video and media over the school’s existing WAN. AVI-SPL integrated Tannoy speakers into the TelePresence system and installed 70-inch Sharp displays as confidence monitors. Rialto is also using a Crestron control system. The goal was to allow Rialto students to take virtual field trips that would provide all the educational benefits of a traditional field trip without incurring travel costs. It also allows the district to connect with other students and to learn about different cultures. So far, the TelePresence system has been used for a trip to the great Barrier Reef, a visit to NASA and a conversation with students in a San Diego classroom.
The design of the TelePresence room had to be flexible. “They needed to be able to use it as a classroom or a TelePresence room. Usually in the TelePresence environment, the desk and chairs are fixed and they’re positioned in exactly the way they’re needed,” says Jennifer Brown, sales engineer for AVI-SPL. Because the space needed to be used in multiple ways, the furniture in the room had to be mobile. AVI-SPL included custom furniture in their design that could be rolled in and out of the room as necessary.
The digital signage portion of the installation consisted of Cisco displays and Cisco digital media players installed in 72 classrooms. The media players facilitate the digital signage,
