InnerPass Enables Students, Teacher at Leading Virtual High School

FRAMINGHAM, Mass.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--InnerPass, a well-known, premium Skype application used by businesses for online web meetings and collaboration, has recently focused on education; enabling education organizations and schools to deliver Distance Learning with greater ease for students and teachers. Minnesota Virtual High School is one of the largest virtual middle and high schools in Minnesota and partners with school districts across the state. This unique school system recognized the benefits for both students and teachers in their adoption of InnerPass technology.

“The InnerPass meeting rooms allowed for us to organize student information by their case manager and get information to these staff members immediately. We have been able to upload teaching tools, informative websites, as well as readily available resources that our teachers access several times a day.”

Jennifer Nelsen, a Lead Teacher, was responsible for a segment of students with learning and behavior disorders that are both taught virtually by teachers and serviced by remote case managers. A major challenge for teachers was getting students they have never met to enthusiastically participate in every class using online tools such as Skype, email and instant messaging. To the students, this technology was second nature; paired with the custom system designed for the school by InnerPass, the positive results of the implementation for students and staff were evident almost immediately.

“Our students are better served as we are able to show them math problems, diagrams, successful writing techniques, etc. each time a specific question is asked,” says Jennifer Nelsen. “Without that, we often lose students’ attention or they back down from a question if they think it will be too time consuming or too much of a bother to ‘show them’ what we are talking about. Many of the students that come to us have a short attention-span and their patience-level is low. We have been able to capture them quickly and keep them engaged with screen sharing.”

With staff spread over several regions of the state, building collegiality and sharing student files presented several obstacles related to distance. Lead Teacher Jennifer Nelsen says, “The InnerPass meeting rooms allowed for us to organize student information by their case manager and get information to these staff members immediately. We have been able to upload teaching tools, informative websites, as well as readily available resources that our teachers access several times a day.”

InnerPass provides easy-to-use tools, including screen-sharing and “persistent” meeting rooms, which reduce the cost of online instruction, expand access to education and training opportunities, and bring client organizations to the leading edge of educational and training technology.

“The Minnesota Virtual High School is a great partnership for us, because it helped us further integrate with our Distance Learning clients,” says Steve Parsloe, CEO and President of InnerPass, “Especially in the case of the MVHS, we were able to pass along the benefits of collaborative technology to both students and teachers, creating both increased efficiency and cost savings.”

About InnerPass

InnerPass combines Voice, Meeting Content, Online Presence, File Sharing and Meeting Rooms. Moderators and educators can host one-time meetings or create persistent rooms for ongoing discussions. Since becoming a Premium Skype application, the InnerPass community has surpassed 2.9 million users. InnerPass is based in Framingham, Massachusetts. Investors include Stage 1 Ventures and Beacon Angels.

For more information, visit www.innerpass.com. Skype and associated trademarks are trademarks of Skype Limited.

About Minnesota Virtual High School:

Minnesota Virtual High School™ is one of the largest virtual middle and high schools in Minnesota. They use the Internet to deliver education, which opens up a world of flexible learning solutions to help students graduate and find success when their local public school's traditional options don't fit their needs for grades 6 -12.