HUMBOLDT — USD 258 will forgo one tech rich classroom in favor of replacing software and computers in the high school journalism and publication program, board members decided Monday night.
“One of the things you periodically have to do is upgrade your software,” Superintendent Bob Heigele said. The programs in question are used both for the school newspaper and yearbook, and “we want to stay current,” Heigele said.
The purchase “will upgrade all our software for all our classes,” middle- and high school Principal K.B. Criss added.
In addition, “when you upgrade your software, you have to upgrade your hardware,” Heigele said, so 12, 20-inch Macintosh computers are begin purchased as well.
Funding for the software, $10,179.40, is from Title 2D funds. The $18,995 computer purchase price will come from capital outlay.
A $109 three-year warranty is being purchased for each computer as well. “It’s been out experience we have to send two to three of those in” during that time period, Heigele said, and the cost of repair typically exceeds the total warranty cost.
“We’re doing this because we can’t work on the Macs in house,” Heigele said.
A MacBook Pro laptop is being purchased for journalism competitions as well, Heigele said, “because all of these are being done on disc now, they’re getting away from paper copies.”
The new software will also allow video editing. By the end of the school year, classes will be producing video to run on Cox cable public service Channel Six, Criss noted.
“We’ve had a very rich tradition in that journalism program and I thing we need to retain that,” said board member Curt Mueller.
The current computers well be moved to the middle school computer lab, replacing 10 year old computers there, Criss said.
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