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Carol Pryor reluctantly attended Thursday’s annual back-to-school convocation. But she left excited after hearing a presentation about using new technology to engage students.

Pryor, who will have an ActivBoard in her classroom for the first time this year, plans to have her students use it on the second day of school.

“They’ll do an interactive flip chart with me,” said Pryor, an eighth-grade science teacher at Rockingham County Middle School.

Students can expect to see these gadgets in every classroom when they return to school Tuesday. “We have 21st-century technology in all our classrooms for the first time,” said Superintendent Rodney Shotwell.

ActivBoards, purchased with grants from the Reidsville Area Foundation and some state money, are interactive white boards that can serve multiple instructional purposes. Increasing technology in the classroom has been a goal of Shotwell’s since he came to the district three years ago.

Amy Hewitt, a sixth-grade math teacher at Rockingham Middle, said her students will use the ActivBoard to work problems. Hers came with a portable slate that she can carry around the classroom. “It’s got a lot of neat features that come with it,” Hewitt said.

The new technology is a bright spot in what has been a tough few months. School districts remained on edge over the summer as the state wrestled with a budget. Shotwell said the district still has the task of trying to trim $2 million this year as part of cuts the state’s budget imposes on school districts.

Some other changes that students will notice on their return to school next week:

* Fewer students will return this year to Rockingham County schools. Shotwell said enrollment is “just a hair” below 14,000 students. Enrollment has declined in recent years. There were 14,332 students enrolled last year, compared with 14,438 in 2007-08.

The district hired 27 new teachers this year, fewer than in recent years because of the economy, Shotwell said.

* The state asked school districts to consolidate bus routes and cut down miles, said Robert Gauldin, the district’s transportation director. District officials wanted an idea of how much they would spend on transportation, so students were required to register to ride the bus.

Transportation staff spent the summer evaluating bus stops, and some have been consolidated to save money. “My people have the buses ready to go,” Gauldin said. “We feel like we have the routes ready to go.”

Gauldin said about 6,300 students per day rode buses last year, and he anticipates the same number this year. Online registration has closed, but parents whose children need transportation should contact their individual school.

* The Rockingham County Sheriff’s Office will keep a close eye on drivers in school zones, particularly teenagers who speed and don’t wear seat belts. Beginning Tuesday, the sheriff’s office will implement the Parent Aware program. Sheriff Sam Page said deputies who issue a warning or citation to teen drivers up to age 18 will also give a courtesy call to the teen’s parents.

Page said the effort is to make parents more aware of their children’s activities to avoid tragedies such as those that occurred last year. A 16-year-old McMichael High School student was killed in January by a driver who passed a stopped school bus, and a Morehead High School senior who wasn’t wearing a seatbelt died in a car accident just days before graduation. A school crossing guard at Draper Elementary School was hit and killed by a car in February.

Page urged anyone driving near a school bus to slow down and pay attention.

“We don’t want to repeat any of those incidences,” he said.

Contact Jonnelle Davis at 627-4881, Ext. 126, or jonnelle.davis@news-record.com