ISTE 2017: Telestream To Display Video Streaming Tools to Increase Student Engagement

At ISTE 2017 (booth #135), Telestream will present video streaming tools that allow educators to easily and cost-effectively increase student engagement and extend the reach of their lectures, sporting events, and other school events to any audience, regardless of where they are located.

Visitors to the Telestream booth will be able to see how Wirecast, the company’s live streaming production software, lets teachers and students easily create their own professional live shows. Already widely used in schools and colleges around the country, Wirecast is an affordable tool for promoting media literacy in schools, giving students the opportunity to develop professional-level live streaming production skills.

Wirecast enables the creation of live webcasts that combine multiple live video cameras, movies, audio tracks, Skype feeds, images, and titles to make broadcasts for the Web in a matter of minutes.

Using Wirecast, students themselves are able to produce and stream important, milestone school events, such as band concerts and graduations, all while learning valuable digital media skills that prepare them for careers that increasingly require video skillsets. Wirecast also increases classroom reach and student/family engagement by enabling streaming and recording of lectures to provide distance learning to students who cannot attend classes, such as home-schooled children or those with illnesses or disabilities.

“With Wirecast, anyone can create professional live streamed broadcasts for sharing live or on-demand via the web with just a camera, a computer and an internet connection. It’s really that simple,” says Scott Murray VP of Marketing at Telestream. “Educators are finding this technology to be invaluable in giving students an opportunity to work in the world of video — which is becoming the de facto form of online communication in their world. Schools are able to take advantage of growing access to high-bandwidth internet in communities, homes and on mobile devices, to increase their engagement with off-site students, families and communities at large.”

For ISTE, Telestream will be handing out a “Green Screen Toolkit” with hints, tips and links to free resources to help teachers leverage green screen technology. Wirecast’s live chroma key —or “green screen” capability— is a professional feature that allows users to replace their background with video or still images live and in the moment.

“Green screen effects are a great way to make videos more engaging,” notes Tony Vincent, educator, speaker, and creator of LearningingHand.com, an educator’s online resource for mobile and digital learning. “They allow content to appear streamlined and friendly and allow me to easily insert myself into my instructional videos. Production tools like Telestream’s Wirecast and ScreenFlow provide that high production value and allow users an incredible degree of control over everything that appears in their videos.”

ISTE attendees will also be able to see Wirecast Gear, Telestream’s new live streaming studio in a box. Wirecast Gear is highly portable, making it ideally suited for schools hosting special events such as assemblies, sports meets, and graduations. An all-in-one turnkey live streaming production system that requires no set up or configuration, Wirecast Gear includes a pre-configured computer workstation with the Wirecast Pro software pre-installed for just $4,995. Users plug in their cameras into one of the four HD-SDI or HDMI inputs, and they are ready to stream in a matter of minutes.

At the show, Telestream will be offering visitors a special 25% off discount on all new sales of Wirecast software, bringing the entry level price to just $375.00.