Two Area Schools Each Get 10 Computers
By Kathy Louise Schuit
Telegraph Staff Writer
Mountain View Telegraph
January 13, 2005 A5
Two local high school teachers have just upgraded their classrooms to include virtually the entire world.
Science classes at East Mountain High School and Moriarty High School will each receive 10 new computers in February through a grant from the 2004 Computers for Kids program, sponsored jointly by the New Mexico Information Technology and Software Association, Workforce Education Alliance and Technology Integration Group.
With the computers and the high-tech software that comes with them, Kerri Lathrop said her EMHS freshman Environmental Science students, who already work on individual laptops, will realize a greater capacity to research and access information.
“I can implement a higher percentage of the software,” she said.
One important upgrade provided by the new computers will be the ability to use Geographic Information System software.
The GIS program allow students to “explore the environment and view and create different types of maps,” said an EMHS news release.
Additionally, the program provides access to topographic maps so students can learn about the physical landscape of their surrounding area, and the ability to view satellite photos for climate and vegetation studies.
Mostly, Lathrop said, her students will import existing maps and overlay them with data, creating new maps with specialized or area-specific information.
Additionally, her students will study Albuquerque population density and develop ideas for improving the city’s public transportation routes to better serve the population, conserve natural resources and reduce traffic. Other studies will include collecting data on local wildlife and plants and creating maps of critical wildlife habitats.
These studies relate to the environmental science class’ participation in the “New Mexico Watershed Watch program, a water quality monitoring program at San Pedro Creek,” said the news release.
“Students will use computers in the classroom to record and display their data in graphs and tables, to research variables measured at the creek and to create power point presentations. These presentations may include digital photos taken at the creek, graphs and tables, and maps” using the GIS software, the release said.
At Moriarty High, science teacher Dega Patterson will use the new computers for teaching biology.
Besides the GIS program, all students will have the software needed to design energy-efficient homes using technology that includes Internet links to experts in the field, said the EMHS news release.
They’ll even communicate, via e-mail, with scientists in Antarctica studying global weather patterns.
Special Web pages— “Ask a Scientist,” hosted by Newton BBS and “Ask a Naturalist,” hosted by the Sandia Mountain Natural History Center— will make it possible to get answers to questions from experts.
“Smog City,” a simulation program that models the effects of human and natural variables on air quality in urban areas, will allow students to change the amount of cars, factories and wind in a city to see how the changes affect air quality, the release said.
Lathrop and Patterson were notified in November that their grant applications had been approved. They were among teachers from only five schools in the state to receive the computer grant awards.
Students from Albuquerque High School’s Advanced Technology Academy will build all the new computers at a “Computers for Kids Build Day” on Jan. 19.
MHS and EMHS each received 10 computers. Albuquerque School on Wheels Alternative High School received five, Capital High School in Santa Fe received 10 and West Mesa High School received five computers.
