Sunday, March 31, 2013

Technology in High School Education


Death of the author? That is mere understatement of the effect of technology on writing, education, and many other social values. For starters, I don't mean to brag, but I consider myself to be a perfect example of a technologically-dependent person ESPECIALLY when it comes to education. Take my life for instance...

  • When I found out that students could use laptops during class in college, my knees were weak from joy. I COULD FINALLY USE CTRL F ON MY NOTES. I could google obscure words and topics that I didn't understand during class. I could go on Facebook! But when I walked into class on the first day and had that one professor who forbade the use of laptops, I felt naturally inclined to add ten years to what I estimated her age to be. "The professor looks thirty but doesn't allow laptops? She must be 40+ because she obviously still thinks its the 1980's." 
  • Sometimes, I think I'm part of the transition into a new evolutionary epoch, because I question how humans have historically been able read from books for long periods of time. In addition to never being able to read a book without falling asleep, I can never find a comfortable position to sit so that I can read for more than eight minutes at a time. But when I'm using the computer, I can practically do the downward facing dog while stepping on hot pebbles and still type up a five page essay. 
  • One time, I forgot my notebook at home, so I pulled out my phablet (phone + tablet) to take notes, and I probably looked like the most pretentious student in class
I think you get the point, because academic administrations have spent so much time prohibiting and banning the use of cell phones in high school to instill the idea that technology has a negative influence on education; and here I am--sitting in college--not playing games on my phone in class, but rather taking notes on it. Technology has played a huge role in college, and I think it has benefited my academic setting in many ways.

So I think it's time to expand to high schools.

In my high school, the deans turned rampant if they saw an unidentifiable dark square object that might resemble a phone. But when students were smoking outside, they simply turned a blind eye. My high school finally decided to create a computer lab in March of 2012, three months before I graduated. Before the founding of said computer lab, four hundred students had to share the ~12 2006-model DELL desktops spread throughout the school--most of which did not work. In addition to the new computers, my principal also invested in several SMARTBOARDs (picture below) which my teachers called DUMBBOARDs simply because they didn't know how to use them.


I should be thankful that my high school made such dramatic technological advancements at all, but that was only possible because of a grant it received. Most other high schools are still highly deficient and lacking in technology. At the same time, I'm not saying immersing technology into the roots of every academic setting is my version of utopia, because students are still going to text their friends during class and go on Facebook instead of studying. But technology is inevitable and crucial to social development, so why is education administration still demonizing technology and enforcing rules like we live in the stone age?