Maestro Online Reinvents Online Learning for The Classroom

March 13, 2001

NEWTON, Mass. — Although K-12 educators have an abundance of software to teach educational basics, much of it ends up sitting on the shelf because it can’t be customized to deliver teachers’ lesson plans or meet diverse student needs.

Maestro Learning Inc., a pioneering e-learning company, today announced the launch of Maestro Online, a subscription-based online service that addresses these limitations. For the first time, educators with all levels of technical skill will be able to create and deliver customized interactive lessons with rich multimedia content.

This new online innovation will debut at the 56th Annual Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development (ASCD), a national conference and exhibition for administrators and educators, being held in Boston from March 17 to 19.

Maestro Online provides a selection of more than 30 instructionally varied learning tools that educators use to create educationally sound, interactive lessons. With the help of easy-to-use authoring templates and Maestro’s multimedia content library, activities can be tailored for a variety of subjects, teaching styles and student needs. Educators can publish the lessons to Maestro Online’s e-Learning site for 24/7 Internet access or to a CD-ROM. Maestro Online provides a self-contained environment for teacher directed web- based instruction without advertising or links that expose students to inappropriate content.

“Most teachers must sift through catalogs with vast selections of out-of- the-box software products that don’t meet the needs of all their students,” said Steve Garfinkle, CEO and co-founder of Maestro Learning, “Our goal is to inspire enthusiasm about the Internet as a medium for instruction by giving educators the power to make the content and methods of technology-based learning relevant and useful.”

With Maestro Online, teachers can create interactive tests, reading and writing activities, tutorials, skill explorations, multimedia projects and practice games with the look of professional educational software. Students, in turn, are engaged in learning through an enjoyable, child-friendly medium that also hones important skills and reinforces academic standards.

Massive investments in computers and Internet connectivity over the past several years have made technology significantly more accessible to students across the U.S. However, time constraints and varied levels of technology expertise continue to discourage many educators from employing technology as a meaningful instructional resource. These barriers and the lack of relevant online content sparked the creation of Maestro Online, according to Garfinkle and co-founder Peter Dublin, EdD. Dublin is an educator with more than 30 years of experience developing educational software including Bank Street Writer, the original, best-selling word processor for children. Maestro Learning is the next generation of Dublin’s personal mission to give teachers resources for integrating technology into mainstream classroom learning.

Fifteen schools in five states — Massachusetts, Connecticut, New York, Louisiana and Florida — have already forged partnerships with Maestro Learning, and are currently demonstrating Maestro Online in grades 2 to 5. Maestro Online is available now by annual subscription or site license. To give schools a head start on creating their own interactive curricula for the Fall 2001 school year, charter subscribers are being offered three free months of the service for purchases made before June 1, 2001.

Those attending the ASCD Conference will be able to create and customize activities, which they may take back to the classroom on CD-ROM. “Ultimately, Maestro Online is about helping teachers improve student achievement and assisting students meet today’s new educational standards,” said Dublin.

About Maestro Learning, Inc.

Formed in 1999, Maestro Learning, Inc. is a pioneering e-learning company based in Newton, Mass. whose mission is to improve student achievement by making interactive technology a practical classroom resource. Maestro Learning brings to this challenge more than 20 years of experience developing successful educational software and multimedia titles including Bank Street Writer and numerous products for leading textbook and electronic publishers.

Maestro Learning’s unique online service for K-12 schools, Maestro Online, gives educators the ability to create and deliver interactive lessons that can be customized for local curriculum using a suite of instructionally varied learning tools. The lessons can be delivered from the company’s e-Learning web site, Maestro2learn.com, or from a CD-ROM. Maestro Online is available to school districts and schools by annual subscription or site license for the Fall 2001 school year.

Contact Information

Patricia Favreau

The Castle Group, Inc.

(617) 227-0012, x225

pfavreau@thecastlegrp.com

Lauren Berman

Maestro Learning

(617) 965-0800, x210

lberman@maestro2learn.com