Systems for Education
"Education is not the filling of a pail, but the lighting of a fire."
- W. B. Yeats

Lighting the Fire

"Smart Classrooms" and "Distance Learning" have become the pacing educational AV and multimedia need for schools and universities today.

Often the smart classroom is evolved into a distance learning facility simply by the addition of connections to a network or a CODEC and ISDN.

Design considerations focus on the intelligibility of the program. Whether the professor is being supported by a computer graphics presentation (such as Power Point) or a video tape is being played, the visual aspects have to match the classroom's size, lighting and seating arrangement while the audio portion of the presentation (and in many cases the reinforcement of what the professor is saying) must be designed to maximize the delivery of information to the eyes and ears of the students.

Questions to consider

Video projection screen size and the brightness as well as resolution of the projector itself are critical. Will computer presentations be made? At what resolution? How far back is the farthest student? What control can be exerted over the lighting? Is the lighting directional (typically incandescent) and dimable or non-directional (typically fluorescent) and strictly on or off?

These issues must be answered during the design phase of the project. General Projection performs site surveys of the physical aspects of the room and just as importantly, discusses the information distribution goals with administrators and the professors themselves.

Automation

Further, a professor is seldom going to take the time to learn every aspect of a complex electronic system. They simply haven't the time if they are going to perform their primary mission: lighting the fire! Thus, automation is a key element of any system we design for education. A button on a panel that says "start presentation" is much easier on an educator then explaining they must first route the VCR to the scan doubler and then to the projector as well as select input A on the projector and so on...

Design Resources
If you are in the process of designing a new facility or upgrade, visit our AV System Design section. In this we cover a variety of design topics and considerations as well as provide resources to some excellent design information sites. Also, visit our Vendor Support page for links to vendors of products that may fit your needs.

Many educational facilities require furniture that will support the audiovisual and video conferencing needs of the project (such as smart lecterns and teaching stations). Visit our Furnishing Design considerations page for more information on that subject.

Success Stories
General Projection has built smart classrooms and distance learning systems all over the country. From the computer classrooms at Stanford University to the humanities classes at UC-Berkeley; from medical teaching auditoriums at Johns Hopkins to the liberal arts programs at Appalachian State University, our firm has designed and built facilities that serve 10 to 1,000 students simultaneously.

Distance Learning
Distance learning provides a school with the means to both distribute their talents throughout the world as well as to bring specialists into the classroom without the need for their physical presence. Interactivity is a key requirement of distance learning. Students do best when they can interact with the presenter. Thus the ability for both "ends" of the distance learning conference need to be able to see and talk with one another.

Microsoft Corp. Chairman Bill Gates, right, sits with Hewlett-Packard cofounders David Packard, left and Bill Hewlett, center as they watch the dedication ceremony at Stanford of General Projection's systems.

Bill Gates Computer Science Building - Stanford University

Brevard Community College - Multi campus distance learning router control system.

U. S. Army War College - Syncronizing classrooms.

Smart Classrooms
"Smart classrooms" provide an instructor with the ability to present a large variety of media to their students. This includes computer sources (PC's, Macs, etc.), video tape sources such as VHS, S-VHS and Betacam, as well as newer sources such as digital video (DVD) and streaming video services over wide area networks (WAN).

University of North Florida - Smart Classroom becomes distance learning hub!

Appalachian State University - multipurpose classrooms.

National Defense University - smart classrooms served by "smart carts."

Southwest Texas University - smart classroom.

UC-Berkeley - automation in the classroom.

Air University - Smart classrooms.

City College of San Francisco - multiple, linked smart classrooms.

Auditoriums
Auditoriums for schools of higher education are a special design situation. The ability to convey information to hundreds of students simultaneously is a specialty of General Projection. We study the lighting, screen size needs and acoustics to determine the best system to meet the need of a large body of people. Automation is even more important since the presenter is typically so far from the technology supporting the presentation.

Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine - Training auditoriums.

United States Marine Corps Command and Staff College - College auditorium and smart classrooms.

West Point Military Academy - Main Hall