Campus Renovations
Western Illinois University, located in Macomb, Ill., is set to debut its Digital Rec Center (DiRC) in fall 2021. The center will play home to the university’s eSports team and offer students a space for competitive gaming, console gaming, a virtual reality station, and more.
Campus Facilities
A large concrete slab, part of the façade of Van Hise Hall on the campus of UW-Madison in Madison, Wis., fell three stories and crashed near the building’s entrance on Sunday. No injuries were reported.
Sustainability
A school district in Northern California will be adding new infrastructure to bring down the cost of recharging its electric school bus fleet. Palermo Union Elementary School District has signed with AMPLY Power, which will supply energy management intended to reduce the cost to a dime per kilowatt hour versus 19 to 39 cents/kWh under the previous charging program.
- By Dian Schaffhauser
- 04/07/21
Campus Sustainability
A New York school district is now generating all of its electricity needs through a 4.1-megawatt solar project. Maine-Endwell Central School District in Endwell activated its system, located on district property next to an elementary school, on March 23. It's expected to save the district more than $6.2 million in future energy costs over the course of 25 years.
- By Dian Schaffhauser
- 04/06/21
Campus Construction
North Carolina's Meredith College will soon resume work on a new facility to house the institution's communication and exercise and sports science programs. Construction plans had been paused in 2020 when the pandemic struck. The building will be located on the northwestern side of the school's 225-acre campus.
- By Dian Schaffhauser
- 04/06/21
Campus Technology
Purdue Online has recently launched a Disaster Recovery Certificate course for construction professionals. The course was developed as a means to educate workers in the construction industry on the nuances between disaster recovery work and normal construction practices.
Campus Facilities
Device sanitation solutions company iCleanse recently launched its newest product, the iCleanse Swift UV. The Swift UV serves as a chemical-free UV-C disinfection station for mobile phones and was created for a wide variety of markets including airports, retail stores, restaurants, doctors’ offices, corporate offices, higher education environments, and more.
Campus Facilities
Ball State University, located in Muncie, Ind., held a virtual ribbon cutting for its new Esports Center this week. The 3,600-square-foot facility will serve as the home of the College of Communication, Information, and Media’s new Esports program.
Campus Technology
Web security platform ContentKeeper announced this week that it’s launching a generation cloud filtering and security platform designed specifically for use in K-12 educational environments. The ContentKeeper Cloud helps teachers and administrators maintain the balance between letting students explore the Internet to access potentially valuable content and basic student security and safety.
COVID-19 and Schools
Victory Innovations, a provider of surface disinfection solutions, announced that it is expanding its yearly “Keep Kids Healthy” campaign, which launched in 2018. The company will donate electrostatic sprayers to underserved schools, and it will offer more than $10 million in product discounts to help combat the spread of COVID-19 in newly reopened educational environments.
Campus Modernization
The San Diego Unified School District has officially begun modernization projects on two of its schools: La Jolla Elementary School and John Muir Language Academy. California builders C.W. Driver Companies broke ground on both construction projects last week.
Campus Facilities
VS America, a leading provider of school and office furniture solutions, will host a webinar on Wednesday, April 14, titled “Learn How to Transform Learning Spaces Using COVID-19 Relief Funds.”
Campus Operations
Becker College, a small private college with campuses in Worcester and Leicester, Mass., announced on Monday that it will shut down at the end of the academic year. The college’s permanent closure is due to financial difficulties exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic.
Campus Renovations
The University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, Pa., is in the process of revamping its outdated biomedical library into what a press release calls “an open center for cross-disciplinary learning, prototyping, and collaboration.” The university is working with Voith and Mactavish Architects LLP (VMA) to finish the renovations by June 2021 and open the building to students for the fall 2021 academic semester.
Campus Technology
vFairs, a hybrid and virtual event platform, will be offering its services to public schools, colleges, and universities as the second graduation season of the COVID-19 pandemic draws closer.
COVID-19 and Schools
A news release from CatchOn, a data analytics and application monitoring solution used by K-12 schools, reveals that digital engagement among students has increased during the pandemic. A comprehensive data analysis suggests that even if districts saw a sharp dip during the beginning of remote learning, the level of engagement has since spiked above normal, pre-pandemic standards.
Campus Technology
An upstate New York public school recently saw a major upgrade to its AV capabilities through a partnership with Ashly Audio and Advance Sound Company. Stissing Mountain Junior/Senior High School of the Pine Plains Central School District in Pine Plains, N.Y., updated its suite of audio amplification and control solutions to serve not just the school’s students and faculty, but the wider community.
Transportation
Two Illinois public school districts recently purchased electric school buses from Georgia-based bus manufacturer Blue Bird Corporation. These buses are both the first operational electric school buses in the state, as well as the first commercial application of vehicle-to-grid (V2G) technology in the country.
University Research
Solar panel arrays that cover canals and other waterways—also known as floating solar farms—have become an increasingly intriguing possibility as sustainable energy practices gain momentum. Researchers from the University of Stirling in Stirling, Scotland, and Lancaster University in Lancashire, England, have finished the first detailed model of floating solar installations’ environmental effects on the bodies of water they cover.
Sustainability
The Batesville School District in Batesville, Ark., isn’t the first school district to save money on utilities by switching to solar power. It may, however, be the among the first to pass those savings directly to teachers.