Moving One-to-One

Laptop HPX360 to be deployed to students second semester

For every MN student, Christmas will come twice this season. On Jan. 5, 2017, each student will receive a laptop as the school achieves its goal of giving each student their own laptop.

The program, called one-to-one, starts when students and staff return from winter break; freshmen, sophomores, and juniors will be directed to Mustang Time and all seniors will go to the auditorium. Every student who filled out their insurance forms and paperwork will be given a laptop.

“The laptop is a HPX360, able to switch between a standard laptop and a tablet. It has a solid HR drive and plenty of ‘oomph’,” Technology Administrator Jeff Yost said.

On the laptop itself, there are several programs that will be vital to students, including Microsoft Word, Powerpoint, and Excel. To complement the desired use of Google Classroom, the laptops already have Google Chrome and other Google products downloaded.

Aside from the laptops themselves, the administration has taken steps to support the use of the laptops.

“The biggest challenge the school will face is providing the appropriate infrastructure to support the devices. Almost a full year of planning by the MPS Tech division has lead to the installation of hardware throughout the school to provide adequate bandwidth,” Assistant Principal Casey Lundgren said.

From the mobile printing stations to putting an internet access connection in every classroom, the school has taken these steps and more to accommodate the  the massive surge of technology.

However, the school is not finished yet. Yost and the tech assistants will be setting up laptop repair carts dedicated to helping students. Located in the tiled hallway between the library and the staircase leading to the language hallways, students can visit this cart and fill out a ticket. The assistants can then find the problem, and assign it to be fixed.

Even with preemptive measures, Yost and the other staff expect there to be a learning period. Students initially unfamiliar with the models will have several resources online in the form of the school’s Twitter Updates and Tips, and the ability to download class specific apps will be available on a website that will be presented the day students receive laptops. With this ability, Lundgren hopes that staff and students will be able to work well with the technology.