THE Grıll
Andy
Pratt
To keep pace with
traveling students,
this IT director is
creating a virtual
classroom.
Favorite nonwork pastimes:
Endurance athletics, and
performing with a comedy
juggling troupe called
We’re Not Clowns.
Second job: Professional
musician, playing piano,
guitar, banjo, bass, French horn
and drums.
ANDY PRATT, director of technology at The Lowell Whiteman School, has to support some unusual schedules. Many of the students at this college-prep boarding and day school in Steamboat Springs, Colo., are competitive skiers and snowboarders who travel the world for training and competitions. Teachers and
students had relied on paper-based assignments and occasional phone calls and, later, a
patched-together recording system. But this year, Pratt implemented a videoconferencing
system to create a much richer academic experience for students while they’re away. And he’s
not stopping there — Pratt is building a technology plan to better use mobile phones and the
Internet to create a virtual campus that can reach students wherever they may be.
What piece of technology are you
never without? My BlackBerry.
How do you deliver academics to your student-athletes while they’re traveling?
Primarily over the Internet. The lectures are videotaped using [Logitech] LifeSize equipment and
