Personæ: Users’ evaluation of a music technology education project

Abstract

‘Personæ’ is an interactive large-scale space sound installation designed by the students of the music technology classes of the ‘V. Gambara’ music high school in Brescia (Italy). The activities that led to the conception and realization of the installation were part of ‘The Discovery of Interactive Spaces’ project, a set of extracurricular workshops organized by the authors of this article between spring 2019 and winter 2020 with the support of the Italian National Operation Program (PON). At the end of January 2020, the installation was presented during a public event and an evaluation questionnaire was administered to 79 visitors. The purpose of this research is to assess how the public, students, parents, teachers and classmates received the ‘Personæ’ installation, and the technology integration within regular study curricula. While the majority of visitors have well received the artistic and communicative value of the installation, the questionnaire reveals that there is not a similar uniformity of agreement on some aspects of technology integration in school curricula.