BY KERI CHAMPION

Staff Reporter

RESERVE- St. John the Baptist School has gone digital. The launch of the new RTC Cable Channel 74 has provided local cable users 24-hour access to school news and events in their homes. The station call letters are WPTS.

The content will be made up of videotaped spots that feature activities and functions at St. John the Baptist Parish Schools and will be available only to RTC subscribers.

School board meetings will be telecast on Tuesdays and Thursdays at 5:00 p.m.

&#8220We are in the process of taping functions and activities in and around the school to be broadcast on a rotating basis on WPTS, channel 74. Shane Brooks who runs the TV station at John L. Ory is going around and getting material together so we can make it available for everyone to see and enjoy.” superintendent Michael Coburn said.

There will be a wide variety of programming available on the station.

&#8220We will have an opportunity for principals to appear on the station to give school reports and teachers to let people know what is going on in the classroom,” he said.

&#8220School board members can appear on the station with committee reports and district news. School plays, weather reports and lunch menus will also be shown,” he said.

&#8220This is a wonderful way to let the community know what great things are happening in St. John Parish Schools,” Coburn said,

The shows will be broadcasted from the studio at John L. Ory Magnet School and Coburn said he hopes to see teachers and students from other schools participate as well.

&#8220It would be great if we could get the two high schools involved in the productions and have video cameras in hand to tape segments that would be used on the station,” he said.

Coburn has hopes that in the future live broadcasts will be televised for the community. In the meantime, he says the system will use the TV station to aid in videoconferencing, which he plans to implement in all schools.

&#8220We will be able to communicate with other schools in the parish along with statewide and even national school systems,” he said.

He said much of the credit and vision of the station was made possible through Delia Taylor, public information officer for St. John Parish Schools.

&#8220She has worked hard, first with an unsuccessful venture with Time Warner to get a TV station for the system, and then with RTC who did help us to bring the station to the schools,” Coburn said.

He was very excited and thankful to RTC for the opportunity to bring the channel to St. John Parish.

&#8220They have embraced us with open arms and have done everything we asked for. If we needed something all we had to do was tell them and it was done. They have been great to work with,” he said.

&#8220 I believe that this will be an enormous step forward for the parish and I am looking forward to the future of this project,” he said.