Tech meets imagination in the new Emerging Technologies Lab

12th grader Maggie McGee smiled as she placed the latest Meta VR goggles over her eyes. Across the room, other students in the EPHS Advanced Journalism class were testing out the new green screen’s capabilities. Even more Eagles were experimenting with the Adobe creative software suite on computers nearby. Just moments before all of this activity, Superintendent Dr. Josh Swanson and Foundation for Eden Prairie Schools (FEPS) Executive Director Dr. Lisa Sisinni had cut the ribbon to open the new Emerging Technologies Lab at Eden Prairie High School. Now, students in Communication & Arts Pathway classes were exploring all the exciting new opportunities it offered.

More than a year ago, when FEPS was deciding how to award a $100,000 grant in honor of the district’s 100th year, the oversight committee was looking for a few things: a project that would impact a large number of students across the district, a way for staff to identify and engage with evolving student needs, and a cause that would contribute to Eden Prairie Schools’ legacy of excellence. This was the vision for the new Emerging Technologies Lab — and now, in December 2025, it had become a reality.

“The idea of a lab is not only a physical space, but it’s also a concept — of us testing and trying and figuring out what works and what doesn’t work over time,” Dr. Swanson said at the ribbon cutting ceremony. In alignment with the district’s Strategic Plan, the Emerging Technologies Lab would be a center of personalized and authentic learning, a home to “devices and tools that might be emerging in the technology space to be able to help drive the future of our thinking and make sure that we’re really on top of things,” said Dr. Swanson.

To ensure the lab would constantly be at the forefront of technological advancements — and to make it applicable to all interest area pathways — the team that implemented its design imagined the lab as a “museum with a rotating exhibit,” said Director of Technology Tina Moses. “Every semester a different Pathway is going to be the focus, and we’ll go out and find tech to bring in that will give you industry-level exposure to elite tools that are used in the Pathway where you have interest in maybe pursuing a career.” The first focus of the Emerging Technologies Lab was Communication & Arts.

The Meta VR headsets, industry-grade green screen technology, creative software, digital signage capabilities and motion tracking cameras currently in the lab are all designed to support hands-on learning, offering students opportunities to create and experiment in multimedia storytelling, digital art, immersive journalism and more. For FEPS, it was especially important to give students access to cutting-edge technology that positively supported the integration of artificial intelligence. “As AI discussions were heating up and technological breakthroughs are happening at a record pace, it seemed fitting to focus our funds in this area to provide as many resources as possible to district students, teachers, staff and, quite frankly, our entire community of Eden Prairie to have a place to explore, experiment and learn how to most effectively implement technology into their daily lives, with this space serving as a focal point and catalyst to make that happen,” said Sisinni during the ribbon cutting. “And I think we did just that.”

Soon, the Emerging Technologies Lab will become available for staff across the district to visit with their students, and it will also support community programming (keep an eye out for more information coming soon about how to use the space!). For the Eagles experiencing it for the first time on that ribbon cutting afternoon in December, the lab felt like a shiny new playground. “At the end of the day, what we want is for you to go in and create,” said Moses. “You’re playing with it. You’re creating. There is not a lesson plan once you walk through that door today. We just want you to play.”