To show the audience just how much technology has infiltrated everyday life, student Lauren Tesaro asked the nearly 200 parents and others in the Fox Chapel Area High School auditorium to take out their cell phones.

"Don't worry. We have permission," she joked, adding that the visitors' phones wouldn't be confiscated.

Soon, what had been a darkened auditorium glowed with the lights from rows of cell phones.

Those attending the school's "Flip the Switch" open house also got to see just how much technology has infiltrated the classroom.

The March 18 program showed parents, community members, faculty, staff and students the new technology the school has acquired with a $520,630 grant from the state Classrooms for the Future program.

Fox Chapel Area's award was the second largest in the state and the largest in Allegheny County for 2007-08.

The goal of Classrooms for the Future, which started awarding grants in 2006-07, is to bring laptop computers, high-speed Internet access and teacher training to all high schools in the state by 2009.

Fox Chapel Area High School has equipped 20 classrooms with 360 new laptop computers, interactive white boards and LCD projectors with the funding, student Michael Boylan told the audience.

The school district created a student team to work with 26 ninth- and 10th-grade teachers since August to come up with new methods of infusing technology into their classrooms.

The district chose to implement the program in ninth and 10th grades so that after the students become familiar with technology, it will be a natural progression to expand it to the 11th and 12th grades, Superintendent Anne Stephens said.

Fox Chapel Area has started its programming with four core subjects: English, math, science and social studies.

After a musical opening for the "Flip the Switch" program, Michael and Lauren performed a humorous skit.

The evening also included sessions in which visitors could go into classrooms and take part in interactive lessons to see exactly what programming was being used in the classroom.

Christine Baldwin, of O'Hara, has a son in ninth grade and a son in 10th grade at the school.

"I wanted to go so I can stay on top of what is going on in my sons' classrooms," she said of the open house.

"I went to one of the social studies presentations, and my son had actually done the exact exercise that we went over," said Mrs. Baldwin, who used one of the laptop computers purchased through the grant.

Mrs. Baldwin's experience was exactly what the school hoped for, said Jane Mather, an English teacher and one of the Classrooms for the Future coaches.

"Our end goal was to make sure that each guest experienced a taste of the enthusiasm and rigor of technology-infused classroom," she said.

"A leadership team of teachers and administrators decided to go beyond the 'accountability requirement' by holding the [open house]," she said. "What an opportunity for us to invite community and civic leaders to be our guests and to experience the kind of authentic and interactive learning that occurs on a daily basis for our students."