When the SkoolLive Digital Kiosks first came to campus in February 2015, they were surrounded by an air of mystery. Even now, months after their appearance, students and teachers still don’t know the full story behind them.

“They’re a communication tool, a nice addition to campus as far as [being] just one more avenue for information to get out there,” said Sammer Darwazeh, Director of Activities. “The other great part about them is they actually did not cost us any money.”

Since SMCHS was one of the first schools to establish a partnership with SkoolLive, the kiosks did not cost a penny. In fact, they’re money makers. The school actually gains profit from the advertisements the kiosks display.

“We’re very happy that we were able to be on the forefront,” Darwazeh said. “We’re one of the handful of schools that took advantage of [the kiosks] last year and now the company’s growing and implementing across the country.”

SMCHS helps SkoolLive improve its technology by providing regular feedback on what works and what doesn’t. The company first contacted Darwazeh in the spring of 2013 and came on campus to pitch its idea that fall. But since the software at the time was not advanced enough, a partnership was not established.

“We needed it to be able to show more than just a few slides or be able to push information out from any computer,” Darwazeh said. “There were many features that we needed in order to be productive, otherwise it would almost be more of a burden.”

After months of development, SkoolLive was ready to make its second pitch in the spring of 2014. This time, it struck a deal.

“The kiosks were more robust and their technology had gotten better,” Darwazeh said. “For me, it was great to see in six months how much better technology can get, even in the kiosk world.”

Currently, there are five kiosks on campus located at the activities office, library, lunch shelter, performing arts wall and S building entrance. Each have featured information on almost every single department on campus: athletic competitions, performing arts concerts, campus ministry XLT nights, ASB organized dances, class election campaign posters and food service specials.

The team is working on two more locations for kiosks: the campus store and the back of campus facing the senior parking lot, both of which temporarily have blue SMCHS awnings installed. Other goals for the SkoolLive kiosks include the ability to show unique content on each kiosk, enable the touch screen function and access the Internet.