“The school board on Monday gave district staff the green light to negotiate a contract with Apple Computer that will place laptop computers in the hands of every student and teacher at Springfield Middle School and Gateways Learning Center early next year,” The Register-Guard reports. “The aim of the four-year pilot project, called the 1 to 1 Laptop Initiative, is to increase student achievement by delivering instruction in new, engaging ways.”
“Other schools that have undertaken similar projects have seen better student attendance, fewer behavior problems and a higher level of parent and student participation, district spokesman Jeff DeFranco said,” The Register-Guard reports. “The board authorized a contract not to exceed $800,000, which will cover the cost of the machines as well as ongoing technical support and training.”
Full article here.
Score another one for Apple.
Holy crap, chalk another one up for Apple in the edu market.
“Other schools that have undertaken similar projects have seen better student attendance, fewer behavior problems and a higher level of parent and student participation.”
I would like to read how Mac’s affected such positive improvements in specific student and parent behaviors. Any explantatons?
Awesome.
To put this in its proper perspective: this is a state that is cutting whole weeks from the school calendar, and whose teachers have agreed to work for some number of days for free so that the schedule wouldn’t have to be cut even further. Somebody’s finally realizing that buying good-quality, reliable, safe, fast computers for students is actually a way to SAVE money.
Take that Dull. And cut it with the annoying commercials that are basically just windows ra ra fests. All that mind-share for the future!
Ironic that one of the schools goes by the name “Gateways”
Could you imagine trying that in the “sex in the halls” Los Angeles Mexico City Schools? Ha! It would never work.
Since someone mentioned Dull, how many people have seen a Dull store at the mall? I’ve seen a billboard advertising Dull @ the mall, here in Fairfield, CA but I haven’t seen it myself….
Wondering what they have to offer…..besides crap.
Jayplus, I have seen their kiosks. It’s nothing special pretty much what you said…crap.
I finally got to see the Dell DJ in person. There is a reason they aren’t selling (hint: it rhymes with ‘wrap’). Did you know that when you shut it down it has a little dialog box saying that it’s shutting down? It also takes toooooo long to shut down as well. 0/5 for me.
Also, if you touch a DJ, be sure to bring disinfectant. I don’t know about you, but I felt dirty after I touched it.
It’s just a dogsh*t kiosk Jay. Dell doesn’t have any real stores. Plus their lame ass kiosks don’t even have half of their lousy products there to try out anyway.
Although I am a Mac advocate I don’t think buying every kid a computer is a way to help kids learn better. The two things that kids do on computers in school – play games and type papers is not going to get them the skills they need to aquire family wage jobs. Learning to read, write and to do math is.
Benjamin Huot.
Agreed. But you could make the same argument about blackboards and textbooks. Yet, as a former teacher, I can tell you from personal experiencethat multi-media presentations that can be developed and made on computers are powerful learning tools. Computers have tremendous potential in the schools. You neglected to mention another thing students can do on computers — research — and its up to teachers as it always is to motivate them to do so.
I agree with beryllium. I think that computers (especially Macs with iLife) can be wonderful tools for schools. They can inspire kids to be more creative and outspoken in what they do. And I believe that those are qualities that are just as important in getting some jobs as reading, writing, and math are.
Jack, I am an artist, philospher, and creative writer and so I know the value of the arts and the humanities but the problem with having the school system teach something other than trades or basic skills is that the students are not being taught to think for themselves but rather what to think and when they go into the arts in the schools it is a way of mind control and cultural propaganda that is not appropriate although all too common in a “democracy”. It took me a number of years to unlearn what I was taught in school but it would have taken me longer if I did not already reject what I was taught at the time.
{{{I would like to read how Mac’s affected such positive improvements in specific student and parent behaviors. Any explanations?}}}
By not dealing with crashes that eat their homework and viruses that eat their software, their level of frustration goes down. The result is better behavior, less vandalism, and an end to terrorism as we know it.
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that’s it, i’m gonna transfer! but do i want an ibook school or the sex in the halls school? i already have an ibook 😀
If I had gone to a sex in the halls school when I was a teenager I still would not have gotten any.
good news for Apple, better for dell:
http://www.bizjournals.com/nashville/stories/2004/06/21/daily28.html
“Dell’s share of the U.S. education market in the first quarter of 2004 – 44 percent – was roughly three times that of its nearest competitor, one-time leader Apple Computer Inc., with 14 percent. Hewlett-Packard Co. had 11.3 percent, Gateway Inc. 6.2 percent and IBM 3.7 percent.”
Still, 14% of the edu market is a big chunk, and the sort of overall market share that Apple should shoot for, imo.
“[I]Dell’s share of the U.S. education market in the first quarter of 2004 – 44 percent – was roughly three times that of its nearest competitor…”[/I]
Hey Joe – and what time would you estimate that those Dell computers were actually working???
Like actual time not in the crash/freeze/virus zone?
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