Hope of major improvements under present conditions is little more than a fantasy. Today's technology, if used differently, could bring advances that would improve education dramatically. Ordinary students would make massive gains and restraints on bright students would dissolve. Wherever illiteracy is a problem, it would be eliminated, and handicapped students would have immense new vistas opened to them. If computers are to be effective in schools, however, overthrowing present practices must occur, and that frightens many people.
Opposition is therefore inevitable.
Some human instructors will object emotionally, fearing that more extensive employment of technology will seriously degrade their position. Their trepidation is understandable but groundless. Although teachers will have to alter their accustomed practices, they will reach a new level of importance, will accomplish more, and will have greater job satisfaction when schools take advantage of the power of computers. Some parents may also object to technology fearing that an Orwellian world will engulf their children. This fear is also false.