guests assembled for the banquet. “We want to be

guests assembled for the banquet. “We want to be the best in Virginia. We are different. We are small. We communicate eyeball to eyeball. Our small size is indeed our strength. We expect miracles in this school division, and we get them.”

He cited statistics showing that scores in sixth grade mathematics since the computer lab was installed have increased from an average overall score of 56.4 to 72. “We couldn’t have done that without Potomac Edison,” he said. He said that the 64 computers in the high school were all linked in a network. “We’re the first school building to be completely networked with Macintosh computers,” Dr. Gangel said.

“Our ratio of computers to students, one to 6.92, is the second best in the state of Virginia. We’re making differences in children’s lives, and I’d personally like to say, ‘Thank you.’”

“You have already thanked me over the last four years by using our computer equipment,” Mr. Kaelin said. “Your school district is a center for innovation. To me it is unbelievable the way the partnership has come together. This little county I worried about when we started has turned out to be the leader in the use of computers.”

When he received his plaque, Mr. Noia remembered that he was Vice President for Finance in the parent Allegheny Power System when he first heard of Mr. Kaelin’s desire to supply computers to the schools in Potomac Edison’s service area. He responded that he thought that Potomac Edison was in a strong enough financial position to be able to afford to give away a few thousand dollars for computers.

His boss told him, Mr. Noia recalled, that Mr. Kaelin was thinking of hundreds of thousands of dollars, not thousands.

So far, Mr. Noia said, Potomac Edison has given schools in its service area $7 million worth of software and hardware, $3 million of that in Virginia. He pledged that Potomac Edison, under his leadership, will continue its partnership with the region’s public schools to supply computer technology as long as the company can afford to do so.

Following the presentations of plaques and speeches, the guests was split into three groups for tours of the schools. They saw demonstrations of desktop publishing, using computers as interfaces in science experiments, the high school’s use of computers for cataloguing and check out at the library, as well as the library’s network center for providing reference works on computers for use throughout the school.

In the technology education department, Joey Dunagan demonstrated the computer-aided drafting program and the new plotter in the drafting room. Dunagan recently finished first in the state in the Technology Students of America competition in computer-aided drafting.

The tour also included the high school computer lab, where students were using computers for word processing, work with spreadsheets, computer programming, drawing and calculus. At the elementary school the guests saw the computers being used for remedial mathematics as well as the large computer lab for all sixth grade mathematics instruction.

Following the tour those in attendance received “memory books” with digitized pictures of several hosts and guests for the evening. These booklets had been produced while the banquet and tours were going on, again using the school’s networked Macintosh computer,

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