Now the Mobile Phone in Every Student’s Pocket Can Be a Portable Classroom: Introducing CICERO-Teach Direct/Learn Direct®
In New York City alone, approximately 300,000 students are currently locked out of virtual classrooms.
The Coronavirus crisis has illuminated a glaring vulnerability in educational Institutions at every level, particularly the public school systems. Worldwide school closings have created the need for safe distance-learning on an industrial scale, but consistent internet access can be unreliable and unavailable to many populations. In New York City alone, approximately 300,000 students are currently locked out of virtual classrooms. New direct-teaching and direct-learning methods are urgently needed.
Set to debut in 4Q 2020, the CICERO Teach Direct/Learn Direct® device, utilizing patented new Chipserver® technology, transforms mobile devices into portable classrooms. It enables teachers to put the entire digital content of every course on an internet-independent memory module to distribute to students for viewing anytime, anywhere -- individually or in groups – on their own mobile phones.
CICERO Teach Direct/Learn Direct is the brainchild of Saul Troen, professor of Biblical Archaeology at Hunter College in New York. Troen takes many trips with students and other groups to places in the middle of nowhere where there is no internet access – such as the ancient Roman Roads in the Negev desert.
Motivated by this need to teach remotely with no internet, Troen worked with software developer Chris Howell to create new internet-independent technology that he christened “Chipserver."
Chipserver technology employs its own signal, within 50-feet of the user, to bypass the internet or the need for an app. It allows information to be securely stored in any amount or format on a memory module to be shared selectively. CICERO Teach Direct/Learn Direct is totally unhackable and is incapable of monitoring the user’s location.
“The need for CICERO Teach Direct/Learn Direct and remote learning has been underscored and made more urgent by the Coronavirus pandemic. And, like the vaccine, it is being fast-tracked,” said Troen. “Students without internet will no longer have to suffer from digital inequality and it will give teachers confidence that all of their students have access to the material.”
Saul Technologies, LLC, is currently securing funding and seeking partnerships; and will manufacture and distribute CICERO Teach Direct/Learn Direct. It will be available to school systems and teaching institutions in the latter part of this year. Prototypes will soon be available to school districts on a limited basis.
View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200401005198/en/