Arbor Springs Elementary School’s newsroom will soon have new equipment to work with, thanks to electronics retailer Best Buy.

The north Coweta elementary school recently won a $2,500 and then a second $15,000 technology grant from Best Buy. It is one of only 36 schools in the nation receiving an award from the company for demonstrating innovative use of technology in the classroom.

The funds will be used to purchase equipment that expands the use of video in all classrooms and video production capabilities at the school.

The grant was awarded to Arbor Springs for the GNN (Gator News Network) news crew, which produces video school news announcements every morning for students in homeroom. The $17,500 dollar grant will fund a shopping spree at the local electronics store, which will provide new equipment for GNN and for every classroom.

“I am very proud of our students and what our teachers have done with GNN,” said Arbor Springs Principal Patti Falk.

Falk said that GNN gives students neat opportunities do something interesting and demanding while also doing something practical for their fellow students every day. It also shows how Arbor Springs teachers incorporate technology in what they do.

School technology support specialist Susan Coggin and teacher Bobbi Deling sponsor the morning news crew at Arbor Springs, and say the funds will purchase new and upgraded equipment. The grant also gives Arbor Springs a chance to win a $250,000 grant in the coming months.

GNN newscasts are run by fourth- and fifth-grade students each morning. Students (who often trade off roles throughout the year) write, read, film and operate editing equipment themselves to produce the morning news, which features school happenings and fellow students.

Teacher Aaron Corley started the Arbor Springs news five years ago, and Deling and Coggin have sponsored it since. “It is fun and for the students who run the news, and something students aspire to,” said Coggin. And every child is involved because every child is on the news at least once during the school year.”

About half of Coweta County elementary schools produce their morning announcements by student newscasts. Smokey Road Middle school does also, and the students in Kevin Pullen’s video technology class at the Central Educational Center produce daily video announcements that let their morning block students know what’s happening at their base high school.

The practice has become common enough that Newnan Utilities’ cable Channel 7 has begun asking schools to send in a special tape each month as a community news broadcast, featuring the elementary-age correspondents and anchors.

“Offering schools a way to produce their own community-wide broadcasts is another way to inform parents about what’s going on in their child’s school,” says Channel 7’s Emily High, who produces the school news broadcasts as the new feature.

“Plus it gives us a way to put more students on local TV. It’s just neat that this technology is getting common enough that schools can give parents and the students this kind of opportunity.”

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