The Clare Foundation has been able to support Pace with a grant to purchase 6 Samsung Galaxy Tablets and protection cases. The tablets will be primarily available for use by 36 children and young people across the primary and secondary school and the LSAs who support them. Additional children will benefit in future years.
Pace is a specialist charity that is committed to ensuring that children with neurodisabilities have the opportunity to reach their fullest potential in life and can take their place in the world. Fundamental to their approach is a belief in every child’s ability to learn and make progress, whatever the physical or sensory challenges they face. Pace delivers life-changing educational and clinical support to babies, toddlers, children and young people with complex neurodisabilities and practical support and advice to their families. They strive to continually advance best practice in their field.
The need was to invest in further tablet devices for their school groups to support a number of key activities within the SMART School programme, as follows:
1) Outcome Measurement for the children and young people through the Evidence for Learning platform.
2) Access for Learning Support Assistants (LSAs) to email and MS Teams to improve their productivity, collaboration and internal connectivity.
3) Control for Promethean Boards to support the delivery of learning in the classrooms and remotely.
This is what Julie Coombes, PACE’s Trust and Philanthropy Manager, had to say:
After receiving funding from The Clare Foundation for 6 Samsung Galaxy S6 Tablets and 6 lightweight protective cases we are pleased to be able to announce that they are now being used in class by the students as well as the staff. Having these devices available has made such a difference to staff as well as students in using the Apps within Microsoft 365, Evidence for Learning and for the students to be able to independently control the smartboards within the classroom environment. In having these extra devices available for students and staff they enable everyone involved in classroom activity to work far more efficiently and be more inclusive.
These devices will allow us to reach a critical mass of mobile technology within each school classroom, an important element of our SMART School programme.
Previously to having these devices in class, the LSAs would have to try and find a device to be able to do something as simple as checking emails, which often meant having to leave the classroom. In turn, staff who needed to use Evidence for learning would equally have to wait for a spare device or worse still, wait until the end of the day and write the case notes up. Lastly, to see the students faces light up because they can now independently use the tablets to mirror onto the smart screens is a joy to watch, and they no longer have the potential frustration of waiting for a spare device to use.
And, here is some feedback from the classrooms:
It can’t be stressed enough that the Clare Foundation have created happy staff and students alike, Thank You!
You can find out more about Pace here: https://thepacecentre.org/
