Meeting of the Federal Media Working Group in Jena

On Monday, the Jena Media Center hosted this year's meeting of the Federal Working Group of Directors of Municipal Image Centers and Media Centers in Germany. Around 600 media centers exist in Germany. The history of these centers goes back to the beginning of the 20th century. Manageable projectors laid the foundations for the use of slides in the classroom. The Zeiss company also played a part in this. In order to meet the growing demand for slide series, many towns and cities set up slide centers offering high-quality materials for hire. An umbrella organization was quickly founded, which can be seen as the predecessor of today's Bundesarbeitskreis Medien.

In the meantime, projectors have given way to interactive displays and work in schools, as well as teaching materials, are becoming increasingly digital. The media centers are also responsible for equipping local teaching facilities with technical equipment and providing advice and training. Representatives of the media centers meet regularly in various locations in Germany to coordinate the special tasks involved in the digitalization of teaching.

Media center in Jena supports schools in many ways

In Jena, the media center's image office is located in the Volkmar-Stoy-Schule, Paradiesstraße 5. More than 10,000 teaching media and a loanable stock of media production equipment are available on site and online. At the Paradiesstraße 6 location, colleagues from the Jena Media Center are working on the implementation of the Digital Pact for Schools. This federal investment enables the extensive use of digital devices and services in schools. Installing and supporting these services is another task of the Media Center team. Through this work, the Jena schools can use contemporary working methods via email, cloud, chat, helpdesk, plagiarism check and learning platform through to WLAN use, the use of PCs, notebooks and pads with standardized access via the created school portal jsp.jena.de(link is external). Training can also be offered extensively at this location.