Rotarians Tour Dryden's Leading Edge "Open Roads" Public School
Posted by John Borst
on May 14, 2012
Dryden Rotary moved their Wednesday April 25th meeting to the site of the city's newest school the controversally named "Open Roads" Public School. The name may be controversal but it is what is inside that is most exciting.
For example this piece of art is embedded into the terrazzo floor.
Each classroom had light sensitive lights so that the lights closest to the window emitted less light than those closest to the opposite wall. Each room also had a white board attached to the front wall and reflected into the white board through a series of mirrors. In thus picture of a Kindergarten classroom note the irregular shaped tables which could be placed together as if a jigsaw puzzle. This class had three iPads for the children to use. Each student from Grades 4 to 8 inclusive also has their own personal notebook computer.
Like this then ...listen to American singer Jerry Mills sing "Come Join Us".
Each classroom had light sensitive lights so that the lights closest to the window emitted less light than those closest to the opposite wall. Each room also had a white board attached to the front wall and reflected into the white board through a series of mirrors. In thus picture of a Kindergarten classroom note the irregular shaped tables which could be placed together as if a jigsaw puzzle. This class had three iPads for the children to use. Each student from Grades 4 to 8 inclusive also has their own personal notebook computer.
Other unusual features of the school are its full size, secondary school standard gymnasium, the presents of a full drama room built on the gymnasium stage, and a specially designed music room with a small recording studio which can be seen in the back left corner of this picture. Note too the special acoustic lighting found in this room.
Rotarians entered the school through its foyer, shown below. Directly off the foyer is the school library where our lunch was provided. But before we ate students arrived to provide small group tours of the facility. It should be noted that the Special Education room had a hospital grade physiotherapy bed with a tracked lifting apparatus for severely handicapped students which could lift them to a washroom with fully accessible shower and toilet facilities.
The Club extends a thank you to Rotarian Jack McMaster, Director of Education for the Keewatin - Patricia District School Board for arranging the tour.