Drones flying into a Sonoma County classroom near you

It takes Shane Cox about 15 minutes to put the white quadcopter drone together. He works methodically to attach the propellers, one by one. He opens the drone’s app on his smartphone, and attaches it to the controller. He calibrates the app to make sure the drone and his phone are communicating. And then, it’s time for launch.

The 16-year-old Casa Grande High School junior places the drone on a patch of dirt behind the library, and starts up the motor. The propellers whir, and teacher-librarian Nathan Libecap turns away.

“This is the worst part,” he says.

The drone takes off successfully, and Cox hovers it at eye level.

Libecap purchased the $500 DJI Phantom Vision 3 for the library in 2015, making the school the first public school in Sonoma County to implement drones as a classroom learning tool, according to Rick Phelan, educational technology director for the Sonoma County Office of Education. Sonoma Academy also has a drone on campus, he said.

“Right now, others are watching them to see how it turns out,” Phelan said. “I would hope they’ll provide a path for other schools, and show how drones can be integrated into a high school curriculum.”

Libecap came up with the idea after meeting another teacher at a conference who brought a drone into the classroom for the children of migrant workers to use. Drones are being used increasingly for commercial purposes such as farming, and so the teacher rationalized that operating a drone might be an important job skill to have in students’ back pockets.

“I thought that was an awesome idea,” Libecap said.

He waited until the model he wanted went on sale, and then with Principal Eric Backman’s permission, bought the drone out of the library’s budget as instructional technology, the same category as purchasing computer software.

“I thought it would be a good opportunity for students to get hands-on experience with the technology that’s going to be a big part of their lives,” Libecap said. “The use of unmanned aircraft is growing, and so the best way to get students to learn about things is to give them the experience.”

Cox is a photographer for the school’s United Anglers class, and he’s used the drone’s camera to check out what’s going on in the campus’ fish hatchery and on the river during cleanups.

Yes, it’s been crashed (not by Cox). But no one’s been injured, and the drone still flies.

“Libraries have always been a place for people to get their hands on technology they don’t have in their home,” Libecap said. “So before there was a computer in every house, there were computers at library branches. The drone is one of those things.”

Students have to go through an approval process before they get access to the drone. They have to prove they can put it together, that they can calibrate it, that they know how to take off and land and navigate without looking at it, just based on what they see on their smartphone screen.

So far seven students have been approved to use the drone, and have used it for things like filming the homecoming parade. Soon, Libecap is going to train someone from the journalism class to use it.

“It’s not something that I would have thought at the beginning that there would be a long line of students wanting to use it, but it’s been steady,” he said.

When Libecap approached Backman with the idea, the principal was all in.

“It’s a form of literacy that many of our students moving into the 21st century workplace are going to need,” Backman said. “It’s going to mean good jobs for them. It’s a skill set that there is obviously an increasing demand for.”

Matt O’Donnell, technology innovation specialist with the county’s Office of Education, agreed with Backman.

“I think, first and foremost, in any type of class video it’s hugely important right now,” O’Donnell said. “Kids really need multimedia skills in almost any field that they’re going to go into, and so using a drone can open that up greatly. If kids can get trained early on in high school, they’re going to have some skills that are going to be immediately marketable.”

You can reach Staff Writer Christi Warren at 707-521-5205 or christi.warren@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter @SeaWarren.