Mar 22, 2007 By Angie Oravec 4 min read

Intermediate Unit 1 held its annual convention Tuesday, updating school board members and superintendents from across the tri-county area on innovative programs its offers. Dr. Lawrence J. O’Shea, IU 1 executive director, said the regional educational agency enables school districts to work together to help each one prepare program participants meet the challenges of an information society.

The IU 1 serves school districts in Fayette, Greene and Washington counties.

“By jointly purchasing goods and services, jointly operating educational programs and participating in professional development activities that focus on common goals, school districts can focus more of their resources on other aspects of their educational systems that make them unique,” said O’Shea at the event held in the Natali Performance Center at California University of Pennsylvania.

Kicking off new programs is the KITS Regional Wide Area Network (RWAN), which creates a virtual private network with increased Internet capabilities for participating schools within the IU 1 service area.

O’Shea said this year marks the first year of a five-year project funded through an e-fund grant and e-rate, a federal discount program that subsidizes technology.

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– addition to providing content filtering, spam blocking and spyware protection, the KITS RWAN will make available the following tools to enhance classroom instruction: Digital Video on Demand, video conferencing, distance learning, student online courses for after-school tutoring, summer school and alternative education, Advanced Placement coursework expansion, world wide co-teaching, Web casting for teacher in-service and adult education/workforce development training, said O’Shea.

By July 2008, the network will be established in 21 school districts, four career and technology centers and at IU 1 and the Pennsylvania Training and Technical Assistance Network (PaTTAN).

In another future program, IU 1 is researching the establishment of a consortium of school districts to provide cyber services to students and recruiting eight school districts to make the venture viable. The move, according to O’Shea, has the potential to save school districts thousands of dollars in the costs for cyber charter schools.

In January, IU 1 received a grant to research how school districts can prepare students for careers in engineering, nanotechnologies and biotechnologies that are emerging in western Pennsylvania.

A science, technology, engineering and math, or STEM, program will look at how to assist in the development of curricula in those subject areas, particularly to utilize a more hands-on approach to instruction and integrating projects such as Science Matters and robotics engineering to create a cohesive network between school districts.

Tuesday’s convention also served as the time for the annual election of directors whose three-year terms have expired. The directors, elected by board members from the 25 school districts in the three counties, remained the same after five incumbents, three who were running unopposed, retained their seats.

From Fayette County, Edward Andria of the Albert Gallatin Area School Board and Nancy Herring of the Uniontown Area School Board retained their posts after Laurel Highlands School Board President Cathy Rice was unsuccessful in defeating them for the open seats.

Richard Krause of the Carmichaels Area School Board retained his seat as the Greene County representative to the board after running uncontested, as did Marie J. Ripepi of the Ringgold School Board and George J. Safin of the California Area School Board, who both ran unopposed as Washington County representatives.

Thirteen school board members – five from Fayette County, two from Greene County and six from Washington County – make up the IU 1 board of directors.

In addition to serving the tri-county school districts, career and technology centers and non-public schools, IU 1 manages the Pittsburgh site of PaTTAN. Its 715 employees are organized around 8 departments and the IU 1 2006-07 annual revenues are expected to total more than $60 million.

IU 1 also operates for school districts a health insurance consortium, which has returned more than $61 million to school districts that would have otherwise gone to the Highmark coffers. The consortium includes special education programs for children with disabilities, 151 kindergarten through grade 12 special education programs, most located within area schools and two alternative schools and services to adult students who are pursuing general education diplomas or working to improve their basic literacy, said O’Shea.