CVUSD iPad program model for other districts
Students in the Cachella Valley Unified School District all have iPads and now districts across the state and Arizona are looking to follow suit. Wednesday nine districts visited the valley to see the technology in action.
“It would be pretty silly to come to school and pretend there isn’t technology in the world,” said Yuma School District One Superintendent Dr. Darwin Stiffler.
Learning at Las Palmitas Elementary School means a swipe, click and typing on their individual iPads.
“What the iPads do is allow the students to access information that I can’t give them,” said sixth-grade teacher Amy Larson Rubio.
“People are, “Oh it’s going to transform schools,” but if you walk into that classroom it’s seamless. Those are just kids learning and a teacher doing a great job teaching,” said Stiffler.
The Yuma, Arizona, school district is one of nine districts, visiting looking to learn from what’s become a model for mobile learning.
“It’s a chance to network to realize in how to share resources. What solution did you do for this? Why are you doing it that way?” said Stiffler. “Kids are having fun, they are learning. Kids here are happy and learning.”
Voter-approved Measure X funds put iPads in the hands of every one of CVUSD’s 18,000 students. Next the district wants to bring the Internet to the students, possibly becoming its own service provider.
“Make sure students are connected at home. We are doing that by putting routers on buses and parking them in certain neighborhoods — that is a pilot program. We want to ensure that all of our buses have Wi-Fi on them so all the students can connect to and from school,” said Superintendent Darryl Adams.
The White House took notice; President Barack Obama met with Adams and other educators in Washington in November.
“We no longer want to be seen as the poor east valley district. We want to be seen as a vibrant and robust school community with a growing economy with students who have the career knowledge,” said Adams.
“I wouldn’t even say it’s the future. I think we are finally catching up to where we should have been,” said Stiffler.
