NORWICH – At Wednesday night's Norwich Board of Education meeting, plans for how to implement the Smart School Initiative, a $2,175,000 bond, were outlined for the board.

Joe Riley, a retired school technology director, has helped 100 school districts navigate this bond and assisted the district in coming up with a plan that follows it's strict guidelines.

According to Riley, the state passed the two billion dollar bond back in November of 2014 and they calculated Norwich's awarded percentage based on the school's general state aid. They awarded the same percentage of the bond that they school received in general state aid.

“You're at about one tenth of one percent of the states general fund aid for the '14 - '15 school year,” said Riley.

According to Riley there are six categories for which the funds can be used. The first is classroom connectivity, which is the networks that support our buildings.

The second is classroom technology, this includes the purchase of laptops, chrome books, interactive displays, projectors, and science lab equipment as long as its computer based.

The third is community connection which Riley said is a very unpopular program.

“The reason is you can't make gifts to members of the community. So example we could write a grant that gives some money to the local library but it's only a loan. And if we gave them network equipment they have to pay for the usage of that equipment. So it's not as attractive to all of them,” said Riley.