Souderton Area School District

Account Background

Souderton Area School District is a semi-rural school district located 25 miles north of Philadelphia and serves 6,700 students and their families each year. Ranked as one of the best school districts in Pennsylvania and the nation by U.S. News and World Report, Souderton has a reputation for excellence in education, and relies heavily on instructional technology to facilitate a student-centered active learning curriculum that maintains this high level of performance. In conjunction with state- and federally-funded grants awarded to the district between 2009-2011, the district was able to update and standardize instructional technology systems across the district, encompassing hundreds of classrooms.

Challenge

Souderton Areas School District has previously invested in interactive whiteboards and other audio visual equipment in years past so it was important to retrofit these assets to maximize efficiency while improving image and sound quality. In addition, faculty often does not stay in one classroom year over year, so standardizing on a design a design was critical. Ease-of-use and reliability ranked as most important priorities for faculty, while cost-of-ownership was an important focal point for SASD’s administration.

IMS Solution

The final design leveraged a wide-aspect display system including a short-throw projector and an interactive whiteboard, 14-watt speakers for sound reinforcement, push-button switch to control power, volume and source selection, as well as digital connectivity. Many classrooms also include a classroom response system that is interoperable with the presentation hardware and software.

Result

Faculty use and rely on these systems to deliver lesson content every day, year round. Having a system that has a widescreen native resolution eliminates image distortion issues, often the first hurdle in improving productivity of a system. In addition, the control switch reduces cost-of-ownership by eliminating the need for projector remotes that tend to get misplaced throughout the school year, and instructors can power on and control the system quickly and reliably. Finally, IMS’ certified trainers support professional development at SASD by providing in-depth training on lesson creation and delivery utilizing the interactive capabilities of the system. In this way, students continue to actively learn in a collaborative, immersive, and engaging environment in which participation is encouraged.

“We chose IMS Audio Visual to help design and install our interactive classroom technology. In addition to implementing and expediting several projects, IMS Audio Visual was considerate of our sizable amount of legacy equipment, and recommended solutions that are consistent with our curriculum goals such as the standardization on SMART Notebook software. The continuing on site professional development along with their excellent service has improved our ability to support each of our schools. IMS Audio Visual was the right fit and an excellent partner for both our large and smaller classroom technology implementations.”