Zeiss announces it recently donated a Primo Star Digital Classroom Microscope to the White Plains School Department, in White Plains, NY. The Primo Star features an integrated HD streaming camera and Labscope imaging software, an easy-to-use imaging app that enables teachers to connect several classrooms to a network. Also donated was an Axiocam 208 8 megapixel color microscope camera, ideal for helping science teachers presenting and sharing laboratory activities. Several White Plains High School science teachers are using the equipment in biology, environment, and other classes to enhance lab activities for both students in the classroom and those working remotely. The donation was made as part of Zeiss’s Science Classroom Outreach Program for Educators (SCOPEs) Grant, established to help teachers face the new challenge of educating students through remote learning.

“It is difficult to offer authentic science learning experiences when you do not have kids in front of the microscope, and they cannot touch things,” said Dr. Margaret Hawthorne Doty, Coordinator of Science and Engineering for White Plains Public Schools. “The Zeiss equipment provides an incredibly valuable resource that helps students feel like they’re getting authentic science at a time when its challenge to do so.”

Integrating Zeiss network-compatible microscopes with imaging systems lets teachers easily create digital classrooms or digital labs and share images with the touch of a finger. The equipment also enables teachers to record high resolution images and videos and share images, reports, and videos.

“With the Zeiss equipment, whether participating in virtual labs or using microscopes in school, all students will be seeing and observing the same thing,” said Jorge Gonzalez, a White Plains High School teacher. Two students can be in the laboratory using microscopes, while the rest can see what the other students are doing on the same day.”

Despite the challenges associated with the COVID-19 pandemic, the SCOPEs Grant helps to ensure science students can stay connected and learn from home. The SCOPEs Grant is open to K-12 science teachers in Putnam, Rockland, and Westchester Counties, New York; Bergen County, New Jersey; and Fairfield County, Connecticut.

For more information, visit https://www.Zeiss.com/microscopy/us/local/scopes-grant.html.