Tech4Teachers – The Academy of St Nicholas in Merseyside.
Case study: The Academy of St Nicholas in Merseyside
Why is closing the digital divide so important?
“The digital divide is extremely wide as it stands. Within out school we have got high levels of social deprivation so by having initiatives like this, it has enabled us to teach the students with the latest technology so they get the best possible experience.”
How will this programme help you?
“This programme will help us as teachers and staff dramatically as we will be able to use more features on the laptops rather than just using stand-alone machines. This will allow us to be pro-active in our approach to teaching rather than reactive.“
How did lockdown impact you and and your school? What challenges did you face with home-schooling?
“Lockdown has had a massive impact on our whole school community in a lot of different ways. Students who did not identify as in need for a laptop did not get one so the students had been completing the work on mobile phones. This was obviously not ideal and for subjects such as Computer Science, it was limiting the activities that could be taught within the home schooling lessons. This therefore has impact on the quality of the lesson that the students had been taken part in.”
What are you most looking forward to / excited about the programme?
“We are using these computers to support our learners outside of the classroom. This will enable us mirror our computer onto the different monitors within our break out areas within our school. As part of our pastoral team, we have issued them to the whole pastoral team to ensure that all students can be included within the learning by working one-to-one with these students.”
What plans will this tech allow you to realise?
“We will be using these mainly for our heads of year to move themselves around the school and support students whilst they are moving around the school. This will enable the staff to support our students effectively with lesson resources and information about specific students that will help them succeed within their educational journey, even if they are not within all of their classes.”