New technology links schools Washington County maximizes distance learning system

LUBEC – Dennis Corso, a Lubec newcomer with a doctorate in education, swears by the video technology that Washington County’s 23 elementary and eight high schools have been plugged into since last year.

Then again, as the distance learning coordinator for the Washington County Consortium for School Improvement, it’s Corso’s job to be on top of the latest video tools for classrooms and teleconferencing.

The brand of video technology Corso is using is called Polycom. It can move among classrooms on a cart.

Its real test will be whether all the monitors, speakers, laptops and wires work for someone like Justin Cyr of Robbinston.

A Shead High School sophomore in Eastport, Cyr is taking an aquaculture class – beamed all the way from the aquaculture center at the Lubec Consolidated School.

“This is the coolest course I am taking,” Cyr said Tuesday.

Students across the county have had access to full courses using Polycom only since September, Corso said.

Cyr and other students in Eastport were speaking on the screen in Lubec, visible to a pair of visitors from Stearns High School in Millinocket.

Technology coordinator Catharine Qualey and guidance counselor Eric Steeves had traveled from one small town to another. They are in search of a technology system that will provide more learning options for Stearns’ 310 students.

The problem back home: The town is talking consolidation with Schenck High School in East Millinocket, eight miles away and with just 215 students itself.

Qualey and Steeves aren’t alone. School personnel across Maine are looking for options that may stave off consolidation among rural schools. Corso, for one, is a believer in Polycom, which is touted as a high-tech alternative to the already popular ATM video teleconferencing system.

As many as 87 Maine high schools are connected through a state Department of Education distance learning project, Corso said. That $15 million initiative under then-Gov. Angus King has put ATM systems in classrooms across the state.

But only the schools whose superintendents got their requests in on time have the ATM systems on-site. The money to bring ATM technology to Maine schools ran out last year, and some missed out on the windfall.

One significant difference between the two systems is that ATM sets up in a single, dedicated classroom. The Polycom system is more portable, Corso said.

All of Washington County’s 36 schools, plus the University of Maine at Machias and Washington County Community College in Calais, are plugged into Polycom. Many of the county’s schools, such as Lubec, also have ATM systems.

The recommendation that the Stearns visitors will take back to Millinocket is that the school consider buying into the Polycom system.

It’s less expensive, for one factor. An ATM system costs more than $110,000 per site, according to Corso. Virtually the same technology – only newer – costs about $15,000 per site in the Polycom system, if done as a high-volume purchase.

“We have looked a little at ATM, but everything is pointing to Polycom for us,” Steeves said. “Teaching by video conferencing is definitely the way to go for small schools. We have had a hard time getting math and science teachers to Millinocket.”

Using technology to offer students more classes than their local school systems can fund is a cost-effective way to stretch dwindling education dollars, Corso said.

Within Washington County, students from several high schools are sharing teachers at once, ever since the superintendents agreed to coordinate their bell schedules this year. Students from Shead, Lubec, Woodland, Machias Memorial and Jonesport-Beals have been using distance learning by Polycom since September.

For example, one eighth-grader in Lubec is using Polycom to take a math course offered by Machias Memorial High School, said Scott Porter, superintendent for both School Union 102 in Machias and SAD 19 in Lubec.

“It’s starting to take place here, not a lot, but it’s coming,” Porter said. “I think it will be a standard in the future as it becomes more and more difficult to get instructors in certain content areas.”

Washington County schools received their $549,715 worth of Polycom equipment with a grant made final 18 months ago by the Regional Medical Center at Lubec as part of the growing telemedicine movement, Corso said.

Now Washington County’s young people are tuning in to the technology as students.

Brian Leavitt is the aquaculture teacher for the Lubec school, where there are 58 high school students. He took Corso’s course at UMM last summer on using Polycom in specialty classrooms, such as his aquaculture lab.

“You can do so many more things,” Leavitt said. “We can reach far more students than just in Lubec.”