1 Dec 2003 10:49
Despite great promise, technology is dumbing down the classroom
Computer illogic Despite great promise, technology is dumbing down the classroom Todd Oppenheimer This past year, as San Francisco school officials were dealing with budget cuts by laying off teachers and librarians and closing school libraries, spending on city schools was increasing in another area: classroom computers. To keep up with the digital age, federal authorities gave city schools just short of $1 million this year to buy 450 new desktop computers. Their goal is to make sure there is at least one computer for every 10 students in fourth through eighth grades. Meanwhile, the state is contributing another $500,000 to high-tech education in San Francisco. These subsidies come on top of the many millions spent in recent years on computer technology in Bay Area schools -- and in every city in the United States. No one knows the exact amount of spending on computers in San Francisco but, according to national estimates, U.S. schools have spent roughly $80 billion on school computing just in the last decade. This, at a time when activities that aren't available outside school the way computers are -- programs such as art and music classes, shop and physical education - - were being cut back or eliminated. Across the bay, for example, Union City's school district spent $37 million in 1996 on computer gear for just 11 schools. To sustain this investment, the district cut back on expenditures for science equipment, field trips and several other academic mainstays. Shifts of this sort have made for a drastic and worrisome change in today's classrooms. Throughout the country, computer technology is(Continue reading)
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