According to the college, the panels have 20 points of touch to enable several students to interact with them at once.

 “ASI supplied not just the technology, but support throughout the entire project: consultation in designing the solution; the hardware; professional development and training for our teachers; and building the solution into the school IT and teaching ecosystem,” VCD IT manager Brenton Wade said. 

Explaining the need for the solution, Wade said the St Kilda-based school needed to manage potential evacuation and lockdown situations and communicate safety information, also signalling to students and teachers when lessons start and end.

 “Most schools have auditory PA systems”, he added. “But with all students and many of the staff here being deaf, traditional PA systems, alarms and a ‘school bell’ don’t do the job.” The college was looking for a way to get important information rapidly to classrooms.”

Now the technology has been implemented, ASI will provide additional training to show teachers how to build more of the curriculum around the panels.

The school indicated that software that comes with the panels, such as the Lynx lesson builder, and Snowflake, a teachers’ community for sharing curriculum-linked lessons, would be the next stage in upgrading its technology with ASI.