http://cs.newhampshire.com/blogs/windham_news/archive/2008/11/12/District-plans-to-give-laptop-to-every-Windham-High-School-student-.aspxBY DERRICK PERKINS Rather than putting a computer in every classroom, school administrators are planning to put a computer in the hands of every student enrolled at the new high school. “One of the things we’ve been doing is trying to researchenCommunityServer 2.1 (Build: 60809.935)http://cs.newhampshire.com/blogs/windham_news/archive/2008/11/12/District-plans-to-give-laptop-to-every-Windham-High-School-student-.aspx#12091Fri, 21 Nov 2008 19:29:26 GMT7b375189-dcc7-4af7-b4d3-2fc751a0220e:12091WindHAM not Wind-dumb"...technological aspect of the Internet age into their everyday learning and help them improve their critical thinking and problem- solving skills." When I think of critical thinking and problem solving I do not immediately think computers. Last time I checked it was the human who thought about the problem and composed the solution and had the computer - compute the solution. If you honestly think problem solving can be taught, it would be by limiting technology not promoting it. That being said, I think college bound individuals should learn some computing skills especially in the science and engineering field. There may be a lot of students going into other fields that do not require laptops. I would assume students will not be granted administrator rights. That way things like programs and websites with chat-room capabilities will be dissabled. I could imagine how simple it would be to cheat, pass notes, lower conduct, and distract students from learning. People who say "Kids in college need laptops..." obviously haven't been in a college auditorium in a long time. Most kids will watch YouTube or Google Video while the professor is instructing. The advantage does not come from having the computer infront of you during class, it's having the computer after class to get additional research completed. As for saving $200k, just think of the number of computers that will be damaged, tampered with, or just outright abused. The "old" style computer room setup allowed for monitoring of how the computers were being used - example: no food in computer lab, always a tech-service person available, wasnt being lugged home in a back pack on a bus, possible theft... Just start imagining the every 3-5 years new laptops being purchased for every student when their equipment becomes obsolete or broken. I doubt the tax payers will enjoy that especially in the economic situation currently unfolding. And what do you do about the children who already have laptops that may outperform or have different operating systems - Mac, Windows, etc. What if a student perfers to use Macintosh but the school offers Vista, should that student be forced to switch? It's definitely a tough call, hard to imagine a unanimous vote FOR laptops when you factor in some of the major downsides. Will be interesting to see how it all works out in the fall 2009 when school starts.