On Feb. 11, from 8:30 a.m. to 3:00 p.m., 65 guests including superintendents, board members, community members and administrators, will attend Mansfield Independent School District’s iPad Summit. The goal of the iPad Summit will be to show how the ipads have impacted instruction, how they’ve impacted students’ achievements and how the students are using them in classes.

All those attending the iPad summit will meet at the Mansfield ISD Center for Performing Arts at 8:30, then make their way to the various high schools to watch the use of the iPads for learning.

“Looking at modern day education a lot of educators are trying to find that silver bullet,” Principal Des Stewart said. “We’re trying to find that one instructional methodology that reaches all of our kids. Here in Mansfield ISD we’ve gone through the implementation.”

Mr. Stewart has observed how iPads have helped students stay organized and submit information this year whether it be assignments, tests or quizzes, and give teachers immediate feedback.

Certain teachers were chosen to have the guests visit their classrooms during class time to observe how the ipads are working. Those teachers were instructed to try and utilize as much of the iPads as they can, such as administering quizzes and daily work on the iPad.

For Theater Director Jeremy Ferman, the “showing off” of the iPads won’t be much of a challenge in his curriculum, for he has transferred most of his assignments from paper copies to the mybigcampus.com, a site that helps teachers administer assignments and grade quickly.

“I love it. I don’t want to go back to making paper copies. It’s convenient, the research is at the students’ fingertips,” Mr. Ferman said.

Mr. Ferman will administer assignments in his three classes as follows: theater three and four classes will take online tests to figure out which acting style suits their preference, while his technical theater class are going to use the iPads to edit sound and music for sound design. The schedule Mr. Ferman laid out for his students only mimics that of other teachers who will participate in the study, who hope to display how effective the technology increased student achievement, student performance and student instruction. Also, from an economic standpoint, the new technology cuts down on the amount of paper used in the classroom.

“The generation [students] are growing up in, and the generations to come, are technology generations,” Stewart said. “[They] all are very, very tech savy and the devices and innovative ways of education far outweighs those that were available to us when we were in [the students] shoes.”