The iPad project: leads to $30 million grant for local schools and award from Apple.

• Position: Caring PEOPLE

The iPad Project that High Point University developed with Montlieu Academy of Technology, an elementary school located less than a mile from campus, produced abundant results in the last year that have changed the lives of numerous children.

In 2011, HPU and three community partners--Businesses for Excellence in Education, the William B. Millis Fund of the High Point Community Foundation and the Joseph M. Bryan Foundation--helped Montlieu put iPads into the hands of its young students. The devices give the children access to a world of information at their fingertips.

In addition to the devices, the university donated resources and time. Staff and faculty from the Information Technology Department and the School of Education worked to help teachers at Montlieu effectively implement the technology in their classrooms.

Montlieu was a prototype school that would eventually answer the question, "Can technology improve classroom learning?" That question was answered with a loud, roaring "YES!" at many celebrations the school hosted this year.

The grades to prove it

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The first major sign that the devices were improving student learning came in July 2012 after they had used the tablets for one full school year. The school's principal, Ged O'Donnell, announced that EOG scores increased by 13 percent in the 2011-2012 academic year, with significant gains made in math and science. O'Donnell noted that this was the first year when students had the resources to create iMovies, Keynote presentations and iBooks based on their research. The school also jumped from 59.3 percent proficient in 2011 to 72.1 percent proficient based on annual test results.

Throughout this year, HPU education majors dedicated time to the school to not only help the students learn through the iPads, but to gain experience in the classroom in preparation for their own teaching careers.

"This experience is exactly what our education majors needed to prepare for classrooms of the future," says Dr. Jane Bowser, assistant professor of education, who played an instrumental role in the project. "Many times, after they've gone out student-teaching in other schools, they've told me that technology isn't really implemented in classrooms. But now, we can say that it is implemented in classrooms that are just down the street from us, and they'll understand how to use it in their own curriculum."

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Creating a legacy

The beauty behind HPU's iPad...