Public schools cannot make the same requirement, but a few nationwide are experimenting with mandatory laptop or hand-held computers through combinations of government funding and private grants. Many advocates say laptops in schools is a promising way to end the digital divide between the races. That's one reason middle and high schools in Virginia's Henrico County will be distributing laptops to all students over the next three years. We're not going to get rid of textbooks. On a more limited scale than Henrico County, all 179 eighth-graders at Piscataquis Community Middle School in Gilford, Maine, have laptops.
Cost is a big problem, as well as maintenance, and training for staff.
Other school districts have nixed the idea of mandatory laptops after meeting strong opposition. He cites affordability for families and theft as the top concerns. The high expectations of vendors, corporate executives, and techno-enthusiasts have not been met in greater efficiencies in teaching and learning, revolutionizing of classroom instruction, or higher achievement that can be attributed to the uses of computers. While a few teachers have pioneered imaginative ways to reach students through computers, the majority, pressed by demands of classroom schedules and district requirements, underuse technology, he adds. At Lakeside, the parents' campaign against mandatory laptops ended recently in a wary compromise.