Research notes from the conversion pipeline team.

Unlike proprietary software requiring expensive licenses, Google Slides is completely free with any Google account. This removes significant barriers for cash-strapped school districts and individual teachers.

A district with 2,000 educators averaging 50 SMART Notebook files each means 100,000 files requiring conversion. Manual processes aren't just inefficient—they're impossible.

Every lesson plan is a record of what worked. That creative fraction explanation, the interactive timeline that made history click—these proven strategies deserve preservation, not digital obsolescence.

For teachers with 10 years of curriculum—hundreds of files organized across folders—manual conversion isn't just impractical. The .zip upload feature changes everything about bulk conversion.

SMART Notebook files aren't typical documents—they're proprietary containers bundling interactive elements, multimedia content, custom fonts, and specialized educational tools that simply don't have direct equivalents in standard formats.

Beyond the initial $3,500 hardware and $500 installation, districts face $200-$600 annual software licensing plus $400 maintenance costs. Over five years, total investment reaches $6,000 per unit.