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Alabama Schools to be First in US to Get XO Laptop
CountryGeek passed us a link to a story in the Birmingham News, saying that schools in the Alabama city will be the first US students to make use of the XO laptop. The piece touches on a bit of the project's history, and seems to indicate the Birmingham school district is ready to make a serious commitment to these devices. "Langford has asked the City Council to approve $7 million for the laptops and a scholarship program that would give Birmingham students with a C average or above a scholarship to college or tech school of their choice. The City Council has not yet approved the funding. The rugged, waterproof computers will be distributed to students on April 15, Langford said, and children will be allowed to take them home. If a computer is lost, the school system can disable it, rendering it useless, Langford said. Students will turn in their computers at the end of their eighth-grade year."
Alabama you say? That's entirely natural. After all they were supposed to be for the third world... ;-)
I don't recall OLPC allowing any of these things in the US, it was starting strictly in 3rd world countries wasn't it?
I thought a C meant that you were doing exactly the work that's expected of you (aka, Average). So now they're going to award scholarships for performing like you should? Crazy!
This guy's the limit!
What part of: "The City Council has not yet approved the funding." = "schools in the Alabama city will be the first US students to make use of the XO laptop."
The opening up of the university system to all and sundry has already lowered standards and resulted in grade inflation. Just compare the rigour of an undergraduate education a half-century ago to the situation now where anyone (even me) can breeze through four years without a challenge. Is paying for college for people with a C-average instead of directing them towards only vocational training--as in many other Western countries--a good idea?
Why on Earth do grade school students need to be issued a laptop? Early education should be about learning the basics. I remember not being able to use a calculator even in college Calculus classes as the professor thought it made people lazy and dependent on them. I do agree that schools should have computers, but every student?!?! Computer labs work just fine and cost a lot less than issuing every kid a computer.
gasmonso http://religiousfreaks.com/Comment removed based on user account deletion
Oh I come from Alabama with an XO on my knee.
Genesis 1:32 And God typed
Well, clearly, you are performing at below expected level, so wouldn't get the scholarship.
The laptops are universal, and not a reward. The scholarships are for C average or better, and are arguably not a "reward" either, so much as a recognition that either college or technical school is as necessary as a highschool diploma was a few decades ago, and the area wants to improve its economic condition, it would be desirable for the baseline to be moved up to include being able to attend one of those institutions.
Yeah, sure, its a change, but there was a time when education beyond the eighth grade was exceptional and only open to those with wealth or who impressed a wealthy benefactor with their performance. Heck, there was a time that that was true of formal schooling period. The baseline moves.
"University" != "college" != "college or technical school".
I just heard that the governor has signed a law in Alabama raising the drinking age to 35. He wants to keep alcohol out of the high schools.
just a joke.
This is a feel-good measure, nothing more. Tossing a laptop into a mix of bad teachers, and bad schools is not going to improve anything. There are several major problems, none of them technology related, that have made public education a colossal failure:
1) Most of the people who are teaching subjects, have their primary education in "education."
2) Teacher's unions.
3) School policies that don't allow proper discipline for disruptive students.
4) A legal system that actually listens to parents who sue when schools properly punish their kids for misbehaving.
5) Government monopolies that make it financially impossible for most parents to afford to send their kids to private schools or homeschool them.
But it's ok, technology will save the day. It couldn't do a damn thing for other social problems like pirating copyrighted materials, but it'll be able to take on... entrenched bureaucracies, good ol'boy networks, unions, crufty legal codes and parents who have no ability to hold their kids responsible for their behavior and are willing to shout and sue at the drop of a dime. Go technology, you modern day messiah of secular America.
So you're saying it's got the nappy headed hos thing going for it?
Eloi are stupid, throw morlocks at them!
No, you've got it all wrong. Because all of our lower-education but higher-paying jobs are moving away, we need more people to go to college. We can't afford to relegate all of our C students to truck drivers and welders, as you say: those jobs are going to be filled by D and F students, dropouts, and immigrants.
It's getting to the point where the college degree is a relatively unimpressive feat in today's world.
Don't sound so elitist. It's a good thing that a college degree is a common feat. For a lot of students, college is the first place that's going to make them think and work. If these C students can't do it, they'll drop out fast and become truck drivers. If, however, they are genuinely hard workers but just not bright, or bright but never motivated, they'll get out of college the tools they need to get a better job, live in a better place, have better health care, and raise kids able to get Bs and As and lead a better life.
Should every child go to college?
To reiterate: no. But, we need more than our B and A students going to college. Because the jobs left in our country require either no-skill or the education from a college degree, we need get our "average" student into college.
It doesn't hurt to be nice.
I live in Birmingham, AL and think that it is a great idea to be equipping our children for life in the real world. Mayor Larry Langford's efforts, to this end, should be lauded.
On the other hand, and there is always another hand, this particular instance is a shell game. Birmingham (and sadly Alabama in general) has been the victim of poor leadership and frequent deception. In this case newly elected Mayor Larry Langford, formerly mayor of a nearby, poorer, decaying locality, rented an apartment in Birmingham (but never lived there) in order to become eligible to be elected in Birmingham as mayor. He has been pushing a dome stadium for years (10+) believing that he can attract a professional football team(never NFL, mind you) and turn Birmingham, AL into a tourist attraction.
In order to do this he wants to raise sales taxes on everything (food and necessities included). This is a regressive tax on the poor and uneducated who will not enjoy the fruits (if there are any fruits) of their taxation.
He has been trying to pass this for years and now he thinks he has it.
Birmingham cannot let him distract them with the XO laptops under the right shell when there is a dangerous, expensive, disasterous dome stadium under the other one.
Laptops=good idea
Dome stadium/Birmingham as a tourist destination=WTF???
cabalist
Airbus is about to start manufacturing aircraft in Alabama. ThyssenKrupp is well established. Mercedes makes cars their.
I was stationed in Alabama for a year. While there, I had a world-class Shakespearean theater at my back door. I loved living in Alabama.
668: Neighbour of the Beast
If you give everyone with a C or better average a scholarship to college or technical school, as the proposal described in TFA would, then those who have the performance to be admitted to college can use it to go to college (which most C students will not unless they have impressive test scores, extracurriculars, and/or demanding courses in which they got the Cs), and those who don't have the performance or inclination for college can use it to go to a technical school. So I don't see what you are objecting to: the proposal seems to have the effect you desire.
But in a way....it is lowering the standards, just like we're doing in so many other areas. With a college degree, this cheapens it. It is pretty much already the case that todays college bachelors degree, is the equivalent to the HS degree of a few decades ago. In the past and bachelors pretty much ensured you'd get a good paying higher level job. Now, a BS or BA is the minimum requirement for almost any job besides riding on the back of the garbage truck.
Rather than lower the standards to "C", and having to teach remedial courses in college, why not start earlier in high school, to encourage learning the basics and getting those A's and B's.....so they can be ready for higher learning.
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
Hmmm, this is what happens when you lower the bar.
We're competing globally, so now the best of the best foreigners are winning over our C average. Yep, that piece o' paper can't mask the fact that an average Joe is just an average Joe.
Pushing our average through college with taxpayer monies still doesn't help them compete with the brightest from other countries if they are just average.
Talk about a worn out stereotype. statemaster.com defines the lynching statistic cited as Number of total people killed by lynching from 1882 to 1968. Per capita figures expressed per 1 million population.
Hardly relevant or timely but thanks for promoting the racist stereotype.
You're just lucky you put it on the internet where nobody from Alabama can see it.
You need to look at the rates there genius, not the overall number. Of course California is going to be higher than all the others, they have more people! In rape, gonorrhea, suicides, AIDS cases, syphilis, HIV deaths, and new AIDS cases California ranks middle-of-the-pack to near the top when you look at the per capita rates. Other than motor vehicle theft (California has by far the most vehicles per capita so no surprise there) I couldn't find the other stats so I don't know. But if you're honestly arguing that the deep south doesn't have a problem with health and education, you're crazy. And for the record I don't live in California, and in general I really dislike California.
i highly recommend reading this article... an article on larry langford's past by our local alt weekly political writer langford bankrupted his last city he was mayor of... he wasn't even truly a resident of birmingham when he was running for mayor. he has two investigations looking into his previous actions right now... if i were olpc, i wouldn't have anything to do with this man. he has big visions and not much follow through, other than bankrupting whatever he touches. i hope this won't be an egg in their face when it fails. i would specifically read about his previous political computer endeavours with "computer help for kids." it's a company he was running with richard scrushy (his wiki entry), the man in jail now for bribing our democratic governor and bankrupting healthsouth. there's some good info on it in that first article... it's why he's being investigated. and alabama isn't as bad as ya'll make it out to be... at least not the metropolitan areas. it is considered third world once you get down in the black belt in the western side of the state.
I'm planning to have XO's in the hands of every student at my school (Oak Hill Academy; central North Carolina) outfitted by the end of this year.
I might buy that Birmingham will be doing the first large scale public school deployment (Go Birmingham!!) in the U. S. but not the first U. S. students.
The thing about things we don't know is we often don't know we don't know them.