The schools of Charles County, Maryland, move foward with new communications technology.

Although rural Charles County, Maryland, boasts of its historic villages and bucolic bicycle trails, it's still only an hour south of Washington, D.C., and thus keenly aware that the real world can sometimes intrude on serenity.

Bijaya Devkota, CIO for the Charles County Public Schools, led the implementation of an Internet Protocol (IP) Communications network that connects the district's 33 schools, serving approximately 26,000 kids. While Devkota reports the converged voice and data network has saved the school district "thousands of dollars per month" on infrastructure costs, one of the big benefits has been the deployment of a phone-based application that helps with attendance and parental notification.

The school district uses an application from LiteScape Technologies called KIDS (Knowledge Information Delivery System), which runs on some 3,600 Cisco IP phones throughout the district facilities. One of the features allows teachers to take attendance. If a child is absent, the teacher can automatically access contact information for parents from a central database and call to find out whether the child is ill or simply late.

The information is also useful if a child becomes sick during the day. "We’ve set it up to show the parents’ home phone, work phone, or home address," says Devkota. "That way, the teacher can contact the parents quickly." The same profile reveals whether the child has allergies or another medical condition that requires special treatment.