ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Tuesday, December 17, 1996 TAG: 9612170028
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV-3 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
DATELINE: PULASKI
SOURCE: PAUL DELLINGER STAFF WRITER
All 11 of Pulaski County's schools will be linked in a wireless real-time computer network early in 1997.
The county School Board gave its go-ahead Thursday night to complete the network, which has been tested with a mountain-top antenna providing computer communications to and from Pulaski County High School.
"That pilot has worked well," said Jim Sandidge, the school system's information systems manager. "We have thoroughly tested the technology, I feel. It's worked through ice, snow, thunder. Weather is not a factor."
Sandidge ought to know. He climbed several hundred feet up a tower with other technicians to get the antenna in place and working.
On Thursday night at the School Board office, he and Research, Development and Innovative Technology Director Isabel Berney happily demonstrated on a lap-top computer how the high school link worked.
There was no telephone, no modem, nothing but a wire leading from the lap-top to the broadcast mechanism. With a click on a pull-down menu, Sandidge was instantly in communication with the high school's home page.
He and Berney ran through demonstration home pages that will be used by students at the county's two middle schools and eight elementary schools when the rest of the wireless system is up and running. That could be in early January for every school except the more remote Riverlawn Elementary.
Riverlawn presents some problems because of its location, out of sight of the antennas used to beam the signals to all the other schools. Sandidge said several alternate options are being considered, from bouncing a signal off a commercial radio tower to bouncing it off Radford High School. A dedicated telephone line might even be used, he said.
Such lines to all the schools would be too expensive, but the cost of just one line might be less than some of the other options, such as building a separate mast just for Riverlawn.
"Riverlawn will be the last link. Everything else is quite doable with our people," Sandidge said.
The lower cost is the major benefit of wireless communication technology. The company providing it to Pulaski County is also offering a 10 percent equipment discount, Sandidge said. "And if we wait, the technology will go up in price," he said.
The board opted not to wait. But it also learned that the computer technology has drawbacks as well as dazzling communications options.
Five years ago, Pulaski County voters approved a bond issue to install computers at every grade level in every school. The school system has some 1,700 computers and 26 networks. Now, some of that hardware is wearing out.
"We've lost three servers. We've been able to bring one back. We're going to lose more this year, I feel certain," Sandidge said.
School officials must soon decide whether to try to patch up the 5-year-old computer hardware or go to more advanced equipment. "Do we want to go back to what we had, or do we want to make some changes?" Superintendent Bill Asbury said.
Going back would be difficult, because changes in computer technology quickly leave behind last year's technology, much less that from five years ago. But new equipment would mean teachers would have to get in-service training on how to use it.
"Where are the teachers going to get this time," asked board member Rhea Saltz, "with the SOLs [standards of learning] and all that?"
The board approved a proposed priority list for servicing and repairing down computers. The schools have only two technicians to keep all 1,700 computers and 26 networks functioning. The school system in neighboring Montgomery County, by comparison, has 10 technicians.
Saltz also had reservations about an elevator planned to be built at Dublin Middle School, because the school system hopes to get a school construction program under way in a few years. Some of the construction scenarios call for replacing Dublin Middle School.
The elevator cost is estimated at $168,000, Saltz noted, and the building could be out of use in a few years. He urged consideration of going without an elevator for another year or so.
Asbury said he hated to see the money spent at a building that could be replaced, too, but the county needs at least one handicapped-accessible middle school and Dublin is better suited for the elevator than Pulaski Middle School. He said the parents of wheelchair-bound students have been patient with the school system for not providing it sooner, as required by law.
The board approved a recommendation by member Jeff Bain to schedule a visit to each school during Jan. 15, to see the shortcomings in existing buildings.
The board changed the date of its January meeting from the regular second Thursday, because of a meeting in Richmond of the organization of rural schools that is fighting disparities in education funding. The board will meet Jan. 16, and will start its session at 5:30 p.m.
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