Denville, New Jersey college prep school introduces iPads, interactive whiteboards, podcasts, a school app and ‘frictionless tech-based learning environment,’ supported by a 100 percent fiber network.
JERICHO, NY, October 23, 2012 – Optimum Lightpath®, a market leader in Ethernet-based communication solutions for New York metropolitan area businesses, today announced that Morris Catholic High School has taken learning to new levels as a result of deploying its 100 percent fiber network.
Morris Catholic High School serves 40 towns and communities within Morris County, New Jersey. The school enrolls 430 students, grade nine through 12. Before working with Optimum Lightpath, Morris Catholic experienced ongoing Internet outages and had limited bandwidth, making it challenging to roll out the latest technologies to support learning. Teachers were frustrated that certain online elements couldn’t be incorporated into the classroom and students sometimes had difficulty connecting to the Internet to conduct research.
“We knew that we had to make a big change to our network infrastructure in order to introduce new technology-based learning initiatives for our students,” said Michael St. Pierre, president of Morris Catholic High School.
A World Of Change And New Opportunities
Upon installing Internet Voice Bundle from Optimum Lightpath’s Education Services Suite, Morris Catholic was able to infuse more technology into its curriculum. It also looked for ways to evolve how it communicated with students and families. The overhaul has resulted in the introduction of a school podcast, Apple® iPhone® and Google® Android® apps, and the rollout of interactive white boards. This school year, Morris Catholic began an ambitious one-to-one Apple iPad® rollout for all of its ninth graders. The school intends to eventually deploy iPads to every student in every grade.
“Everything from the classroom environment, and how students are learning and being engaged, to how the administration is interacting with each other and students has totally taken on a new life,” said Matthew Alpaugh, director of communications and alumni for Morris Catholic High School.
Morris Catholic has also benefited from an administration perspective. The school is relying more heavily on email and IRC chat for communication, and the cloud to host a variety of documents that students, staff and school families can access directly. When the school needs to increase bandwidth, St. Pierre knows that it can do so quickly to keep the school moving in lockstep with its latest pursuits.
“Morris Catholic is constantly challenging the status quo,” said St. Pierre. “We want to be known as a school that is rife with innovation and part of that means working with innovative companies. Optimum Lightpath presented us with tremendous network options at a value that made partnering with them a no-brainer. The result has been a frictionless technology-based learning environment without boundaries.”
Optimum Lightpath’s Education Services Suite has helped educational institutions achieve cost-savings over communication services and significant bandwidth boosts for greater flexibility in deploying new digital learning tools. As a result, schools are able to change the way education is delivered by empowering students through distance learning, interactive whiteboards, intra- and inter-campus communication through video conferencing, virtual field trips, one-to-one laptop initiatives, all-digital homework and assignment processes, real-time status update access for parents and more.
“It is especially rewarding to watch how the technology that Optimum Lightpath brings to market can help the leaders of tomorrow learn in new ways,” said Julia McGrath, senior vice president of marketing and business development for Optimum Lightpath. “As schools throughout the New York metro area continue to evaluate new ways to advance tech-based education initiatives, we’ll keep working to pack innovation into our Education Services Suite of products to help them reach new heights.”
Optimum Lightpath has named Morris Catholic High School its Customer Spotlight of the Month for October 2012. For more information about Optimum Lightpath, visit www.optimumlightpath.com.
About Optimum Lightpath
Optimum Lightpath, a division of Cablevision Systems Corporation (NYSE:CVC, news, filings), is an industry leader in providing advanced Ethernet-based data, Internet, voice, video transport solutions and managed services to businesses across the New York metropolitan area. Optimum Lightpath’s Network is a highly reliable, resilient, and scalable fiber-to-the-business-premises network extending more than 5,000 route miles connecting more than 5,500 fiber-lit locations. Exclusively focused on meeting customer needs in the world’s largest business market for 20 years, Optimum Lightpath has been continually recognized for its high level of customer service. For 14 straight years, the New York State Public Service Commission has given Optimum Lightpath its Commendation of Excellence. Optimum Lightpath has received many industry awards for innovation and leadership, most recently being named the 2011 North American Regional Service Provider of the Year by MEF. For more information, visit www.optimumlightpath.com.
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