I read Jone's blog last night and it really got me thinking about the school's budget problems. Classroom teachers have always spent a lot of money out of our own pockets to make learning fun and exciting for our students. This year I seem to be spending more and more to meet the needs of my students and to just keep the classroom running. As I am learning about all this wonderful technology my mind is racing with ideas to use in the classroom. However; there is no money to up date the prehistoric equipment that we have and it is very hard to justify that type of expense out of my own pocket. Gus would probably blow a gasket if did. I am trying really hard to convince Gus that we should buy a new digital camera for home and a new Ipod for Samantha so the old ones I could have at school. He is not buying that as a wise investment right now. Knowing how badly the schools all across the state need money to just keep running it makes me think that we have to start reaching our hand out farther than our own pockets and the pockets of the families we serve. Corporations and local businesses may need to lend a helping hand. Kate's husband made a great choice to give the companies used but good furniture to the school. Many companies have to update their technology quite often, couldn't that help replace the really out of date resources schools have? Maybe we need to just start asking. It is in the best interest of every citizen that our children all get a good quality education. The schools, the Union and the government all need to start advertising and lobbying for our kids. If everyone invested just a little of what they have or recycle and donate what they are not using it would make a huge impact on our kids.
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Keep your eyes on the news this week. Your suggestion is actually coming to fruition. There is a community group that has been taking on sections of the MMSD technology plan. One of the groups is school and community partnerships and they will be announcing their project plan that encourages area companies to donate their equipment to the schools.
ReplyDeleteThat said, Epic has recently donated some tablet PCs. While that sounds like a great idea, these machines apparently aren't working so well with the MMSD infrastructure. While they were working just fine when donated, by the time the tech team at MMSD did what they had to in order to roll them out, the majority of the 7 machines wouldn't run on the MMSD system or recognize the wireless network.
I guess the question becomes, does the MMSD system need to be revamped in order to accept these donations? At what point can we assume students and teachers are doing the right thing? Can we stop putting so much protection on the equipment for those few children who stray such that the machines will function for the schools as well as they had for the businesses? The turn over for a company computer is 3-4 years. The turn over for an MMSD machine is 9 or so. The gain might be 4 years if MMSD can get the machines to work...