Anonymous benefactor blesses Illinois school with Apple eMacs, iMacs

“Sunny Hill School will bring a new meaning to student teaching this fall, when third- and fourth-grade students help train their peers to use computers,” reports Cristel Mohrman for The Barrington Corrier-Review. “Through donations to the District 220 Educational Foundation, two Sunny Hill classrooms will feature about two dozen computers apiece this year. Each student will be assigned his or her own computer, which will be used daily for language arts, Internet research and even math lessons.”

Mohrman reports, “About a dozen students from the two classrooms were acquainted with the new computers last month to give them a jump start. By coming into the school year with some knowledge of the computers, they will help their teachers train their classmates this fall. ‘It will be great because I love to help,’ Rachel Robertson, 8, said.”

“Fourth-grade teacher Gail Hart’s classroom will include 22 new Apple eMac computers this year. After seeing the impact a computer-based curriculum had on colleague Dee Grande’s students last year, Hart said she expects her students to benefit from having their own computers in the classroom. ‘I think I’ll see a big jump in their skills — their computer skills, and their academic skills,’ she said. ‘I think they’ll be a lot more confident as a result. I’m excited about it for that reason,'” Mohrman reports.

“Fourth-grader Sarah Westman said the computers Sunny Hill students used last year ‘looked cool.’ She used an eMac computer this summer for the first time and said she thinks it will be fun to have a computer of her own this year. When the program began with Grande’s fourth-grade classroom last year, only a few of the students had computers in their homes. The number of students with their own computers has since doubled, after parents saw their children benefit from their use, Sue McGrath, District 220 Educational Foundation chair, said. ‘We’re very excited for the foundation to be part of this initiative,’ she said. Combined with the expense of other computer equipment and custom-made desks, this year’s donation is expected to total about $30,000, McGrath said,” writes Mohrman. “Sunny Hill received a first donation of 26 iMac computers and other equipment, valued at more than $36,000, through the foundation last fall from the same benefactor, who has requested anonymity.”

Full article here.