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SMART Board Interactive Whiteboard Improves Instruction for Broadcasting Students


Interactive whiteboard boosts student learning and enthusiasm at Specs Howard School of Broadcast Arts

Calgary, AB – April 21, 2004 – The Rear Projection SMART Board™ 3000i interactive whiteboard from SMART Technologies Inc. is improving the way instructors at the Specs Howard School of Broadcast Arts in Southfield, MI, teach video and sound editing. Instructors teach editing using Avid® video-editing software and the Adobe® Audition™ audio-editing software on the 3000i’s 66" (168-cm) touch-sensitive screen, creating an effective, whole-class learning environment. The 3000i’s crisp image and integrated audio system allow instructors to display video and sound clips, and demonstrate editing techniques while students follow along.

Instructors used to teach from a whiteboard at the front of the class while students worked at their computers. Instructors often had to interrupt lessons to go and view students’ individual workstations and help with problems or questions. Now instructors and students play video and audio clips on the 3000i, bringing up clips for discussion and controlling software applications simply by touching the screen. Students gain a better understanding of the subject, because they can all see, hear and manipulate the same media clip. By picking up a pen from the SMART Pen Tray, students can also write or draw over clips and software applications in digital ink to highlight information and make notes. Using the 3000i’s Notebook™ software, instructors can record notes to build technical reference guides for the students. By enabling whole-class teaching, the technology has helped keep students working and learning at the same pace. The mobile 3000i is also shared among classrooms to ensure maximum use of technology resources.

“SMART Board interactive whiteboards improve lesson delivery and student achievement in more than 100,000 classrooms around the world,” says Nancy Knowlton, president and co-CEO of SMART. “The use of the 3000i at Specs Howard School of Broadcast Arts helps demonstrate how SMART products can be integrated into technical subject areas.”

“The 3000i is the single greatest tool I have used as an instructor,” says Ryan Cornish, video supervisor and video-editing instructor at Specs Howard School of Broadcast Arts. “Editing is a very creative endeavor. The 3000i facilitates this creativity by keeping everyone on the same page and enabling better communication, collaboration and student participation. It’s so easy to use that it takes students and instructors less than 15 minutes to figure out how to use it. It has definitely added oomph to my lectures.”

About Rear Projection SMART Board 3000i interactive whiteboards
The Rear Projection SMART Board 3000i interactive whiteboard features a large screen housed in a slim, tapered cabinet that fits easily into a variety of rooms and corners. With an integrated projector and innovative touch system, the 3000i delivers superior image quality yet remains simple to use. With award-winning SMART Board software – the power behind all SMART Board interactive whiteboards – notes written on the 3000i can be saved for future reference and distribution. Users simply touch the screen surface to control any computer application or multimedia resource, such as a CD-ROM or the Internet.

The SMART Board product line includes SMART Board interactive whiteboards, Rear Projection SMART Board interactive whiteboards and SMART Board for Flat-Panel Displays interactive overlays.

About Specs Howard School of Broadcast Arts
The Specs Howard School of Broadcast Arts provides practical hands-on training in the areas of radio, television and video production, and acts as a personnel source to those industries. Now in its 35th year, the school has become the most respected media school in the Midwest, with over 2,000 graduates at work in the Detroit metro area alone.

The Detroit News has labeled Specs Howard “The Harvard of Broadcast Schools,” and the industry publication Radio and Records calls Specs Howard “one of the country’s premier broadcast schools.”

With a staff strength of more than 50, the school has recently added three new computer labs, including an Avid nonlinear post-production classroom and an Adobe Audition training room. The latter two classrooms use the Rear Projection SMART Board 3000i interactive whiteboard to provide state-of-the-art training.

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For more information, please contact:

Public Relations
SMART Technologies Inc.
300, 1207 - 11th Avenue SW
Calgary, AB CANADA T3C 0M5
Phone +1.403.802.3337 Fax +1.403.228.2500
pr@smarttech.com

Please note that SMART is written in all capital letters.

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