How my class got a new mac mini!

I went in today to tutor at school. I'm not fully sure what I was thinking on scheduling myself to tutor after returning home from an awesome trip with @mollymittura. Last Tuesday morning, we got up at 2:30am to get ready to fly to Boston to attend the BLC 12 conference from Wednesday through Friday. Then on Saturday morning, we took a bus to NYC and that evening took another bus to Mt. Laurel, NJ. On Sunday, we went to visit Philadelphia and then went to Atlantic City. We came home last night. It was so much fun, but a little exhausting. I think if we do this again, I may rethink the amount of clothing I bring because after the first few hours I cannot even begin to explain how heavy my backpack felt carrying it around NYC and Atlantic City. Thankfully, we did not have to carry it around Philly. Sorry, got a little bit off right there, but back to the story, since I was at the school to tutor I found a lovely new shipment of iPads and a new Mac Mini for my classroom.

When I speak to people about my classroom and I mention that I run a 1:1 iPad program. For people who do not have them in the classroom or have not seen them in the classroom, they are amazed, and are quick to say that they wish their school had the funding to do a 1:1 iPad program. But the truth is, is that I teach in a very small school and money doesn't necessarily grow on trees for us, so how are we able to fund this program? Simple, we have a Race for Education.

For the past two school years, every Spring students and teachers mail out letters asking relatives, family friends, etc. to sponsor us in running/jogging/walking for one hour. And the one thing the PTO was great about was motivating the teachers to take part by allowing us to use 100% of the money we raised to purchase items for the classroom. Okay, I'm not sure how motivating it is to all teachers, but I send out at least 100 personalized letters for this fundraiser. Last year, I raised enough money to purchase an iPad for the classroom. In this past school year, the parents enjoyed seeing what we could do with one iPad that they decided to use some of the money raised from the Race for Education to purchase an entire set for my classroom.

This school year, I raised over $1,000 to purchase things for my classroom. I allotted money towards a new Mac Mini, web hosting, digital camera, tripod, and green screen. All these things, were purchased for my students to use in the classroom. My expectation with these new tools is to teach my students how to create a classroom website and maintain it on the Mac Mini, use their iPads to link their blogs to the website, and create a news station and share what we do in the classroom. I'm also tossing around the idea of starting a podcast.

I guess what I am hoping to get across to my readers in this blog is, don't use the excuse we don't have the money for that. If you really want to see your school or classroom become a 1:1 program, it is possible. The Race for Education is great fundraiser because the school keeps 100% of the donations and you will find many people are very generous for this fundraiser, especially when they receive a handwritten note from a child.