Burbank schools to get more than $2M in tech upgrades
Thomas Edison Elementary School students in the computer lab at the Burbank school in Feb. 2013.
Within a matter of a few weeks, sweeping technology upgrades totaling more than $2.3 million approved by the Burbank school board will give students improved access to wireless Internet and allow them to hear their teachers better through use of new voice-amplification systems and complete classwork on new computers.
The upgrades are part of a key promise school board members made to local voters after they passed a facilities bond called Measure S in 2013.
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The bulk of the cost is tied to installing new cabling and wireless Internet access points on several campuses.
Those infrastructure upgrades totaled $555,954 at Luther Burbank Middle School, $461,580 at Joaquin Miller Elementary School, $375,943 at George Washington Elementary School and $153,293 at Bret Harte Elementary School, according to a district report.
In two other approvals, the school board agreed to spend $152,911 to install voice-amplification systems at John Burroughs High School, as well as improve wireless Internet access on that campus as well as do similar work for a cost of $98,589 at John Muir Middle School.
In addition, board members authorized spending $487,086 at Burroughs and Monterey high schools to install 517 Hewlett Packard computers, which will replace dated ones in a move that is “needed,” said Burbank Unified Supt. Matt Hill.
The district’s technology staff will decide whether the old computers should be repurposed or recycled.
Another $300,000 in Measure S funds will pay for 307 new Hewlett-Packard computers to be installed in eight elementary schools.
Those campuses will include Walt Disney, Thomas Edison, William McKinley, Joaquin Miller, R.L. Stevenson, George Washington, Providencia and Roosevelt elementaries.
The technology upgrades recently approved by the board will likely be made during the summer when classes aren’t in session, and similar work will continue in Burbank schools through 2017, according to another district report.