Teachers here at Amador have received new projectors, fully equipped with futuristic SMART board capabilities.

“We don’t usually use the projector too often, but we have been using it to draw on a lot, which is super fun. Usually we have a lot of free time, sometimes during Advisory, and we’ll just use it to play Tic Tac Toe and doodle and hangman, things like that,” said Sara Vannoni (‘23).

The demands of 21st century learning require advanced technology and the District-wide Technology Projects (DWTP) have provided just that. Approved in March 2020, the DWTP reached its goal of supplying PUSD classrooms with interactive projectors, making it easier for teachers.

“I think, for me, the biggest difference is the flexibility it gives to me as a teacher – to free up space in the front of my room, to use it as an interactive whiteboard. I haven’t quite tapped into that potential, I think, to its max, but I began to use it on Friday and annotated with my sophomores and was able to annotate right on the board and not have a separate piece of paper, so for me it’s just allowed me to use my teaching space in a manner that makes more sense to me,” said history teacher Jill Battilega.

It’s not just teachers who have noticed a difference– students have also felt a change in their learning atmosphere. The new smartboard-like features such as interactive styluses allow students to make the best of their time in classrooms.

“My teacher loves it, she gets really enthusiastic. She likes underlining everything and just being able to really point out small features on the documents she wants to show us. It just makes it a lot more interesting to pay attention in classes that can get a little dull. I think it’s been really helpful and definitely more entertaining to go through the lectures with it,” said Christine Zhu (‘22).

These interactive features are not the only improvement brought by these projectors; the new installations have allowed for teachers to better use their teaching spaces and even prevent classroom hazards.

“I like that I can walk around the front of my room and not have the projector on me and I’m not blocking it in that way, and I like that I don’t need to have a desk set up in the middle of my room now. My desk used to block the projector a lot, people would knock it, it would have to be plugged in, people would trip over it a lot, and so that was kind of a big issue in terms of room layout. That’s been the main change for me,” said history teacher Haley Baldwin.

The addition of these projectors has allowed for the progression of Amador classrooms, technologically and otherwise.

“I think they added more of a futuristic feel to the classroom and I think they’re really useful and more practical because the old projectors had a table that you had to move and set up and it was not straight. The new projector really helped both with aesthetics and adding a modern feel to the classroom,” said Mark Attia (‘23).