BOSTON (WHDH) - At the St. Patrick’s School in Roxbury: old school chalk boards are a thing of the past.
Students at this neighborhood landmark are now learning with high-tech smart boards.
Teacher Tiffany Sawyer loves them.
“It’s an amazing board – and it really helps with learning,” says Tiffany.
But they aren’t cheap! Sawyer and principal Mary Lanata say that each smart board setup costs between $3,000 and $4,000 – and like all things technology – they can break.
So Mary hired a local company to make sure the pricey projectors were always up and running.
“They did a walk through” says Mary. “I was told that two classroom projectors were more than likely to give out within the next few months.”
The cost to fix them – $1,100.
Mary ordered the necessary parts during that walk through back in September of 2015 – so the equipment would be ready to be installed once the projector problems popped up.
And they did – about 6 months later. So Mary called the company.
“I was told they would come within the next week or so and then they didn’t come, ”Mary told 7News. “So i reached out again. “Oh, there was a problem. We’ll come next week.”
But, another no-show – and the problem continued for months. Despite countless emails and phone calls from Tiffany and Mary, nobody came to replace the broken projectors .
After 6 months of silence Mary had to hire a different company to fix the units.
And that meant shelling out another 11-hundred dollars.
“I’m an avid viewer of channel 7” says Tiffany “so I was like I know that they do this.”
After telling us about St. Patrick’s problem , our homework assignment became getting it solved. I spoke with the company’s owner – and he told me that one of his former employees dropped the ball in this case – and is no longer with the company. He also admitted that he should have personally done more to make sure that the school got its money back – and promised he would mail out the refund immediately.
Two money orders totaling $1,080 – the entire amount owed.
“Thank you..this never would have happened without your help” Mary says.
“We’re very appreciative, thank you so much,” says Tiffany.
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