News & Events
TechEDG SLED Partner Summit
April 16-18, 2012
Tampa, FL
This event will showcase the tools and services TechEDG provides to help you take advantage of the growing state, locale and education opportunities.
TechEDG FED Partner Summit
July 18-20, 2012
Washington, D.C. area
This event will showcase the tools and services TechEDG provides to help you take advantage of the growing federal opportunities.
SLED Newsletter Articles
Educating America to Stay Competitive in the World
Students are more involved in their education than ever before and need the tools to be more competitive on the global spectrum. The 21st century student demands a 21st century virtual classroom. Blended learning is believed to become the norm where students supplement their traditional classroom education with online classes giving them a more competitive edge.
The priorities for schools have always been student performance, assessment and providing the tools they need to succeed. K-12 is going through a transformation, including providing alternative models for the delivery of curriculum, smaller technological footprints and going wireless.
Online learning is one of the most significant new instructional approaches available for supporting the improvement of teaching and learning in America's schools today. From providing summer school programs to advanced placement courses, K-12 students are learning more while staying at home. With the current administration's push for wireless broadband access to rural areas, many of these schools will be able to help their students access this information. E-learning also addresses the needs of teachers who are required to take Continued Education Classes each year, giving schools the option of providing web-based training to their staff.
From the desktop to the datacenter, virtualization is helping to transform education for the digital age. "Schools are looking for an easier, more affordable and more reliable way to manage their desktop environments while still providing students and faculty with the ability to stay productive," says Senior Product Marketing Manager for VMware Courtney Burry. "By turning to desktop virtualization schools can centrally and more securely manage a user's data, applications and operating system in the datacenter and can enrich the learning environment for students by providing anytime access to school assignments and applications from any device. Students and faculty can simply launch VMware View and their 'school desktop' is delivered to their machine."
Burry continues, "With budgets the way they are, this is the perfect time for education to look at virtualization. Not only can schools reduce capital outlays with desktop virtualization by repurposing existing PCs, but they can also reduce the ongoing operational costs associated with managing, patching and updating their PC environment-and this amounts to significant savings."
Another way educational institutions are breaking into the 21st century is with the advent of digital textbooks. Many school districts have already made the transition and have found that this shift has created other challenges within the classroom around digital technology. "It's come down to form factor and portability," says Ergotron's Senior Global Director for Education and Healthcare Industry Steve Reinecke. "Some districts want to be really progressive, but run into problems with space concerns and power."
That's where mobile teaching platforms, mobile computer labs and mobile power centers come in. "When a school invests in technology, a lot of times they can't afford to be putting technology in every single classroom," explains Reinecke. "Mobile teaching platforms equipped with a projector, a document camera, and a notebook all in one station give more students and teachers the opportunity for collaborative learning, while at the same time staying within the school's budget."
With the digital classroom comes a question of security. Schools are tasked with providing security on two fronts. They have to manage the data and technology that includes things like student records, but they also have to be aware of students bringing something like malware into the education environment.
"The opportunity is in flipping the conversation around solutions and activities that improve productivity and also fix the problems," advises HP's Director of Americas Channel Marketing, Matt Smith. "Resellers can turn the learning environment into a 21st century classroom providing an optimized solution."
From greater demand to greater educational possibilities, the 21st century virtual classroom provides resellers with opportunities to help students, teachers and schools meet and exceed their education goals. To find out more about how you can transform the ways students learn, and transform the world, call our Business Development Representatives at 8
00-436-5353, ext. 80321, or send an e-mail to
usbusdevgov@techdata.com.