Standardizing Classroom Technology to Advance Teaching and Learning

Forney Independent School District (Forney ISD) in Texas is one of the fastest-growing districts in the nation, serving over 15,000 students across multiple cities and surrounding unincorporated areas. The district has opened an impressive 12 new buildings in the last four years. The district sees itself as serving the entire community, not just its students in grades K-12.

Forney ISD faced several challenges with its classroom technology. The basic setup, a fixed teacher desk with a fixed AV hookup, power data, and AV connected to a projector, meant that teachers had to be at their desks to engage with the available technology. Howard Carlin, executive director of technology at Forney ISD, wanted to find a solution to free teachers from that desk that could be deployed throughout the district but struggled to find a solution to suit a K-12 setting.

“It needed to be fit for purpose. It needed to provide wireless screen sharing and the mobility we wanted. From a technical perspective, it had to support Windows and Chrome OS. It needed room and display security. And no dongles,” said Carlin about their initial requirements. “It could not be a two-part hardware solution because dongles just go missing. And it had to be scalable.”

“And it had to work all the time,” added Kim Morisak, Forney ISD’s chief of operations.  “The worst thing you can do is put a new piece of technology in a classroom and have it not work when the teacher goes to use it with their kids. If it doesn’t, they’ll never go back to it.” Rounding out their list of requirements was ease of use. Anything that required lots of training or advanced technical skills was a no-go. “Any solution needed to be as easy as plugging in a cable, which is what teachers were used to,” confirmed Carlin.

Consumer solutions like Google Chromecast and Apple TV did not meet district requirements for safety and security, reliability, or scalability. Interactive flat panels offered many bells and whistles but were cost-prohibitive, failed to free teachers from the front of the classroom, and required significant training resources.

AV Solution Checks All the Boxes

Forney ISD explored several options before quickly deciding on Vivi , an AV solution designed specifically for education that offers wireless screen sharing as well as other capabilities such as digital signage, emergency alerts, and text and video announcements.

The district initially tested Vivi in three key locations, including the superintendent’s office, an intermediate school, and the IT office. The response was immediate and enthusiastic, leading to a rapid rollout across all classrooms. Vivi is now the AV standard across the district, providing equitable access to high-quality technology regardless of each school’s fundraising abilities.

“We went all in, fast. It’s a testament to how well Vivi sold itself,” said Carlin. “Not only did it meet the needs we were looking for, but it’s also got all these other features as well.”  Morisak explained that once they made the decision, they moved quickly, “We believe that if a solution is really good for a campus, it’s good for all of our campuses.”

The AV Installation

Carlin and his team installed the Vivi solution in-house. In the ideal set-up, the Vivis were attached to the existing projector mount with a 6- or 12-inch HDMI cable connecting it to the projector. The district has a very robust IP network and the switchport capacity to hardware every Vivi. Carlin estimates that about half of their projects already had an available data port run to them, terminating in a biscuit box just above the grid. For the other half, they relocated an existing drop from somewhere in the classroom. A few locations required new cabling; these were limited to locations with non-standard ceiling heights are architecture, such as libraries, cafeterias, or gymnasiums.

The in-house installation resulted in significant cost savings, though it did require more time for full deployment. This worked in the district’s favor, however, allowing for more thoughtful rollout to teachers. Carlin targeted conference rooms first, to expose teachers to the new technology. Those interested, could submit a Help Desk ticket to get Vivi up in their rooms. This made for a very easy transition for teachers and minimized any pushback from staff on the changeover.

Today, all new Forney ISD classrooms are equipped with a whiteboard rising 7-feet from the baseboard, a projector (a mix of Epson, and NEC), a Vivi, a single 27-inch classroom monitor with a USB-C dock that works with teachers’ laptops, a classroom phone, mouse and keyboard. Document cameras are available for any teacher who requests one.

Classroom Benefits

The district’s goal of freeing teachers from the front of the classroom and giving them more flexibility and mobility has been realized. The result is greater engagement. “With Vivi, everyone can be in the app, and everyone can be participating in a quiz, a poll, taking screenshots, making their notes,” said Carlin.

“The beauty of Vivi is that you can be anywhere in the room engaging with a kid and sharing something on the projector, then you can throw control to a kid and the kid can be engaging with the class,” explained Morisak. “Vivi truly is an interactive solution.”

Even teachers who were resistant to technology at first have jumped on board Vivi. “I’ll tell you, there are some people probably using technology now that weren’t using it before because it’s so much easier for them,” Morisak added. “It all comes down to how easy it is to use and how reliable it is.”

As an added benefit, since Vivi is so easy to use and the experience is identical in every classroom, substitute teachers and teachers who move between buildings have little difficulty using it anywhere they go. They all walk into the same AV environment, whether it’s a classroom, a conference room, the library, or even the cafeteria. Carlin summed it up this way, “Vivi isn’t a classroom standard, it’s an AV standard.”

“We talk about standardization sometimes as if it’s a bad thing,” Morisak explained. “But whenever it allows you to do your job better and easier, it’s a good thing. Vivi makes it easier to do your job better.”

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IT Benefits

The two biggest benefits of switching to Vivi from the IT perspective are that it is device-agnostic and is centrally managed. Carlin emphasized how much of a differentiator Vivi’s commitment to being device-agnostic is for K-12 environments, “I have to give the Vivi software team huge credit by keeping darn near fill feature parity across OS. Audio and video streaming across mobile and desktop solutions is hard. It’s just monumental for the flexibility of learning.” This commitment has led Carlin to open his district to macOS and iOS devices.

Carlin counts Vivi Central, the platform his team uses to manage the Vivi deployment, as one of his favorite features. “It’s huge for scalability for a K-12 IT department. We don’t even have one staff member per campus,” Carlin said. “From my desk, I can log in and troubleshoot performance issues. I don’t need to be in the room waiting for something to break before I can fix it.”

Meeting Nontraditional Needs

In keeping with Forney ISD’s mission to inspire students through innovative education, the district opened a new facility, Opportunity Central , (the “OC”), in the fall of 2023. This unique, 350,000-square-foot facility is part career and college center, multi-purpose complex, student-run business hub, and more. Since Vivi is the AV standard across Forney ISD’s buildings, it’s the standard throughout the OC as well.

Every space in the OC is designed with flexibility in mind, including its 600-seat black box theater. The theater was built to production scale and can be configured to be as complex or as simple as the use requires. Vivis are installed on every screen, enabling a ton of flexibility.

Carlin added, “The theater can be bisected and cut into four quadrants and used as four separate rooms, each with multiple displays. Vivi’s multiple display feature lets you take advantage of all the screens in each contained room on the fly. Drop all the walls and you can combine the rooms and present on the big projectors as a full room without needing to call an AV specialist for help. The barrier to entry is near-zero.”

Both Morisak and Carlin are all in on Vivi. They love what it’s done for the district so far and look forward to continuing to push the envelope when it comes to empowering teachers and students across the district. Forney ISD’s experience with Vivi underscores the value of a well-designed AV solution built specifically for education settings.

Vivi’s wireless screen sharing, teacher mobility, central management, and interactive features align with the district’s vision to provide a consistent, flexible, and reliable technology experience for all.