When the creative media and IT students left for the summer holidays last year the Queen Alexandra Charity IT department took over the classrooms in the Karten Centre to fit new equipment thanks to the support of the Karten Network. On their return in September both staff and students were delighted to find 2 x Newline Lyra Pro 65” Screens, 4 x 450 G10 Laptops, 24 x OptiPlex 7010 desktops and 24 x Iyama 24” monitors.
The new screens have replaced items that were purchased in 2004 and are bringing huge benefits. The main comments when talking to students is the fact that they are more accessible and so much clearer which, given a number of our students have visual impairments is ideal. It also enables students to concentrate on the board more easily. Another student comment was how much faster it was to start at the beginning of the lesson and noted how much more reliable they were.
For staff, in addition to echoing the students’ comments, they are enjoying being able to use the board for demonstrations which can clearly be seen by all in the classroom. They are also able to write the lesson and discussions on the board, have it converted to text and then are able to save the lessons as either text or pdf files which is a great aide for students after the lesson. The staff have also been impressed with the number of apps that are now available for them to access.
With regard to the computers and monitors both staff and students note they are benefitting from clearer monitors and the programmes they work on are now running faster than before. One student also commented on how much better it was to have smaller processing units giving them more desk space too.
Coby (Student) “The Screens are so much more reliable and much better than the old one”.
Ahmed (Student) “It is great to have improved technology, our computers are so much faster and take up less desk space too.”
The Queen Alexandra College (part of the Queen Alexandra Charity) currently has 26 students studying IT and 31 studying Creative Media on the following courses:
Level 1 Award/Certificate/Diploma for IT Users (QCF)
Level 2 Certificate/Extended Certificate/Diploma in IT (QCF)
Level 3 Certificate/Subsidiary Diploma/Diploma/Extended Diploma in IT
OCR Level 3 Cambridge Technical Diploma in Digital Media
BTEC Level 1 Introductory Certificate in Digital Media
If you’d like to learn more about the work of the Queen Alexandra Charity (including the College) please visit qac.ac.uk
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