GateWay Community College (GCC) in Phoenix, Arizona, with its approximately 13,000 students, is part of the largest community college district in the United States. The college added 23 new classrooms, a PC networking lab, vocational skills labs, two conference rooms, and a tri-divisible multi-purpose room. They also remodeled the Mariscopa Skill Center, a vocational school and division of GCC.
The new 125,000 square-foot Integrated Education Building has 15 dual-screen classrooms, a single-screen art studio and a three-screen multi-purpose room with a seating capacity of over 200 seats.
Challenge
GateWay Community College wanted a state-of-the-art AV system and IT classrooms to complement their new Integrated Education Building and remodeled Maricopa Skill Center. The system needed to allow students and faculty access to digital AV and HDCP content in a simple-to-use configuration.
They wanted an intuitive model that would be identical in all rooms to reduce the frequency of troubleshooting by technical support staff. They also needed to integrate digital and analog devices in the classrooms and reduce the size and cost of lectern-to-projector cabling.
Solution
The GateWay AV team selected a slim lectern to house the core of the classroom system: the Kramer VP-729 ProScale® digital scaler/switcher and Kramer TP-573 and TP-574 DGKat™ twisted pair transmitters/receivers for HDMI, bidirectional RS-232 and IR signals.
The VP-729 sits at the heart of the conference rooms. They added videoconferencing equipment and a 60- or 70-inch display. The multi-purpose rooms follow the same configuration and include a Kramer VS-66HDCPxl 6x6 DVI Matrix switcher, TP-581T/582R HDBaseT twisted pair transmitters/receivers, and FC-46xl audio de-embedders.
"After comparing the features, complexity and pricing of a variety of products, we decided to use Kramer as a core infrastructure in designing our standardized classroom because it met our needs to handle both HDMI and HDCP," said Senadz Lubovac, Coordinator of Audiovisual Information Technology at GateWay Community College.
Results
"This design with the VP-729 scaler/switcher as the backbone enables us to display any analog or digital AV device on the screens with easy interface control," said Lubovac. "In addition, Kramer's pricing made a real difference," he added.
A graduate of DeVry Institute of Technology, Doug has been in the Technology industry since 1976 and actively oversees Fearing’s daily operations. Along with his wife, Lois, and three others, Doug started Fearing’s in a 600 square-foot facility in Portage, Wisconsin. In the 25 years since, the company has grown to over 30 employees with offices in Madison and Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Doug likes to say he’s a “TV Technician with a dream� going back to his history with the family’s original business-Fearing’s TV and Appliance.
Doug values time with family, watersports, hiking, snowshoeing and skiing. In addition to being a devoted member of his church, Doug serves as Board President for Kinship Mentoring of Columbia County, Board member of Schools for Haiti and Scripture Chair of the Gideons-Portage camp.
A graduate of MATC, Lois oversees Fearing’s daily book keeping along with various HR responsibilities.
Along with Doug, Lois is deeply connected to community outreach, serving as a Board member and Fundraising Committee Chairperson for Kinship Mentoring of Columbia County. She also serves on the Schools for Haiti Fundraising committee. In addition, Lois’ ongoing passion and commitment to provide care for the elderly comes from her 10-year history of working in a Reedsburg, Wisconsin Nursing home.
Lois enjoys singing, hiking, sunny days on the pontoon, and spending time with her 4 grandchildren.
Ehren drives Fearing’s technology by continually seeking out trends to enhance capabilities while supporting Sales, Engineering and Installation teams. Throughout his years with Fearing’s, Ehren’s talent and vision have joined forces to create a wide variety of projects and strategic solutions that exceed expectation.
Ehren loves music, family time, movies, nature, sustainability efforts and electric vehicles.
With 10 years with Fearing’s and over twice that long in the industry, Ben continues to lead, coordinate, and develop the Commercial AV team.
By consistently delivering an outstanding experience and outcome, Ben contributes to the Fearing’s legacy of long-lasting partnerships that truly make a difference. Whatever the Commercial AV need may be, Ben and team deliver at the highest level.
Ben is an avid fisherman and photographer. He enjoys coaching his sons and other youth.
Chris has been with Fearing’s for 20 years and in the industry for over 2 decades. As a Certified leader in Sales Acceleration and trained in EOS (Entrepreneurial Operating Systems), Chris successfully utilizes his skills to lead the Fearing’s Salesforce. Chris and team are motivated and driven to develop new client partnerships while continuing to reinforce loyal long-term relationships with ongoing Service excellence.
Married for 19 years with 3 children, Chris enjoys skiing, hiking, fishing, boating, hunting, camping and golf. He’s also been actively involved as a Youth Football and Softball coach for his family and others.
