A world of classmates

Videoconferencing enables students in Hillsborough to meet researchers, politicians and others from around the world.

By: Donna Lukiw
   Hillsborough High School students have been visiting and working with students from around the world — without leaving Hillsborough.
   The students are staying put in their classrooms and interacting through a projector screen and a videoconferencing system.
   Since Hillsborough High School launched videoconferencing this year, students have had opportunities to interact with other high school students from Oregon, Illinois, Costa Rica, Canada and the United Kingdom.
   "I like them," sophomore Francesca Cintorrino said about the videoconferences. "It’s neat to see another class on a screen and they see us."
   Using phone lines, a projector screen, a camera and an audio box, students and teachers are able to see and hear each other — even if they are on opposite ends of the world.
   Francesca said her biology class participated in a videoconference with a doctor who gave a presentation on the human heart. Students were able to ask the doctor questions using the audio box and the projector screen.
   On Friday morning, Francesca and 18 other students participating in the Technology Awareness Program (TAP) sponsored by Johnson and Johnson took part in a videoconference with students from across New Jersey.
   "I think it’s a better experience because you get to see how the technology works," sophomore Gabrielle Do said.
   As part of the TAP program, students work with Johnson and Johnson employees while learning about new technology, how to solve real-life problems and how to interact in a corporate world.
   At the end of the semester in May, the students will be required to present their final reports on solutions they found to their assigned problems.
   Francesca said that for her final presentation she has to find a better, cheaper and faster way to communicate internationally. By being involved in the videoconferences, she said, she now knows how the technology works, and will be able to explain it in her report.
   Ryan Rahey, TAP co-coordinator for HHS, said this was the first time Hillsborough High School and Johnson and Johnson used the technology together. He said that last year, the students traveled to another site to interact with other TAP students.
   "Rarely, do high schools have videoconferencing on site," Mr. Rahey said. "Since Hillsborough does, we wanted to utilize it. We wanted to use the technology Hillsborough has with the technology that Johnson and Johnson has."
   Throughout the year, students participated in videoconferences in their science classes while interacting with the Columbus Ohio Museum of Science and Industry, studying forensics toxicology, stem cells and regenerative medicine and forensic entomology.
   In social studies classes, students had a videoconference with Vanderbilt University students to discuss racial issues. Computer teacher Geraldine Ryan said the students spoke with Nashville Vice Mayor Howard Gentry Jr., who shared his stories about growing up in Nashville, giving students new insights into the civil rights movement.
   In the coming months, students will watch an autopsy in science classes and listen to the stories of a Holocaust survivor in social studies classes. In physical education classes, students will participate in an interactive human cadaver demonstration that will outline the most common sports injuries of the shoulder, elbow, knee and ankle.