Technology In My Placement

Hello, It's been a long time since my last post. I came back to talk about the technology available in my placement at Detroit School of Arts. They happen to have a plentiful amount of technology but some feel outdated and much of it is unused.

Detroit School of the Arts has been renovated from its original approximately 10 years ago. I am unsure of how or where they got it, but Detroit School of Arts is a gold mine for rather recent technological advances in the Arts! One of their majors (the school has majors which is similar to college programs for majors where students have set classes they must take) is radio technology. Below is just one of the rooms that the school holds for radio broadcasting. They actually host a classical music radio station from the school! They had all the rooms from a studio, phone screening room, to the place that a person would sit and talk into the microphone (second picture). There was one huge room with multiple sound boards and various other controls but I was unsure of that that was used for.

The school obvious has instrumental and vocal music majors. Therefore, the school also has multiple practice rooms for music. Some were smaller rooms designed to fit maybe 2 students and their instruments. Others were larger which could fit around 6 students and a keyboard.

There happens to be a keyboarding class that I had the opportunity to observe. The keyboards would be connected to a computer that could evaluate each student's playing as well as record their keystrokes.

 The theatre students have their own program where they have the chance to learn lighting and sound for the various events and shows put on by the school. This picture below happens to show the schools smaller stage. I have yet to see it be used. It seems that the larger stage is more convenient to use for school wide functions as it can hold the large number of students.

Overall for the arts, I believe that their technology that they have are used well and frequent. That is not however the case for the classroom. My placement classroom happens to have 2 white boards, a projector, and a smart-board. The smart-board is more often than not used as a projection screen. I am unsure if it works or if we don't know how to work it. We also barely use our projector, which has been interesting to watch. It seems that all I've known throughout my years in school is Powerpoints and transparancies. It seems that I am going back in time where the chalkboard (well, whiteboard) is the primary form of visualization. As I asked other teaching interns, I have seen a similar theme that technology isn't used often in the traditional academics. 

My mentor teacher was leading the set up of a haunted house when we came across a studio video camera, one of the ones that you would see in a news broadcasting room with the screen that shows that script and that a person can stand on. My mentor teacher mentioned that they have a lot of technology laying around that no one knows how to use anymore. Sometimes I worry that there are other technologies that are hidden away waiting for students and teachers to tap into. 

Overall, I find that it may be a lack of resources that is causing the under use of technology at my placement. The school is a magnificent building when it opened and still is. Although these days, I have found that the school is under enrolled and under staffed. Half of the science rooms are not in use during this year. Maybe there isn't enough specialists to cover all the technology available for student and teacher use. I am just postulating. 

I do hope that DSA can come back to its former glory and then grow to fulfill it's full potential in terms of enrollment, staff, and the use of technology.