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Ellen Boyd Director of Community Relations ellen.boyd@kcs.k12. nc.us wwwAannapolis.kl2. nc.us Kannapolis City Schools Kannapolis, N.C. ABOUTTHE PROGRAM Kannapolis City Schools launched a technology partnership with the Cabarrus County govern- ment because of a lack of technology funding. No money was available to upgrade, repair, or maintain equipment. The partnership allows the district to use resources and equipment owned by the county to boost technology capabilities. It has given the district more than $1 million in additional equip- ment, resources, and in -kind support, allowing the district to provide more hardware and software to classrooms. County experts help maintain district infrastructure and are on call 24/7. The partnership is equivalent to having a contracted service worth millions of dollars, but it costs taxpayers nothing. THE BOARD'S INVOLVEMENT The technology partnership with Cabarrus County started because of conversations between the chair and vice chair of the school board and the chair and vice chair of the county commissioners. Their dialogue helped form a strong relationship between the two boards and build trust among school and county leaders. Once the idea was discussed by the board chairs, the entire Kannapolis school board unanimously supported the idea. The board has nurtured the technology partnership and is con- tinuing to seek other avenues of cooperation with Cabarrus County. RESULTS The partnership has provided a critical safety net not only for the district's technology infrastructure but also for its overall budget. Now, all district data is backed up to county servers. The district has doubled its capacity in terms of the number of tech- nicians maintaining and repairing its equipment. It has added more classroom technology thanks to the $500,000 one -time allocation and the desktop virtu - alization that came from the partnership. APRIL 2014 • asbj.com 35 Attachment number 3 C -3 Page 72 CONTACT