Texas High School Gets iBooks

bigjnsa500 writes "Starting in December, high school teachers and students in the sleepy south Texas town of Pleasanton will be receiving Apple iBook wireless laptops. The school has installed wireless access points throughout the campus, including classroom buildings, the shop areas, gym, field house and press box at the football stadium. It will be first high school campus in South Texas to go high-tech." Maybe it's just me, but wouldn't that $2.2m over four years be better spent on books and teachers?

Comments

Won't Somebody Think of the Children?

[tb3]

And the radiation hazard from wifi?

Seriously, what happened to that stupid lawsuit those idiot parents were trying to bring against the schoolboard?
And why isn't the Texas schoolboard worried about it?

(And I'll bet every single one of those moronic soccer moms spoke to their lawyer on a cordless phone that has 100 times the power of a wifi set.)

Internet Games!

[Josh Booth]

Even though the computers are locked down (and Mac OS X is *nix so it won't be pseudo-locked like WinXP), kids will still be able probably to play Java games or the like. Or some industrious kids could boot up YD-Linux and do whatever they want.

At my HS, the most common use for TI-8* calculators is playing games. Who says there will be any difference with these computers?

I agree with this guy....

[Asprin]

I agree with Cliff. With the possible exception of teaching programming, computers in schools are an unnecessary distraction. Here's a background piece about his book on the subject.

Re:surely...

[MrResistor]

It's not mutually exclusive to spend money on technological resources and teachers is it?

Yes, it is. Money is a finite resource. The more they spend on tech toys, the less they have to spend on things that will actually effect how much the kids learn, like teachers.

The common arguement, of course, is that the money comes from a different place. That's bullshit. It all comes from the same place, the taxpayers pocket.

I don't mind paying taxes, I think it necessary to keep our society functioning , but I do object to my money being wasted on something of such dubious educational value.