Where is OLPC America? The organization and its leadership are conspicuously silent since Nicholas Negroponte's announcement.
In this void, communities across the United States are charging ahead with low-cost laptop programs. They are making changes at the city and state level to introduce the XO laptop into school systems, often without a full understanding of the costs or benefits of an OLPC-empower learning shift.
Birmingham Starts 1,000 laptop Pilot
Congratulations to Mayor Larry Langford and the children of Birmingham, Alabama! They'll be participating in the first large-scale One Laptop Per Child program in America. Yesterday the Birmingham Board of Education accepted 1,000 XO laptop computers for a pilot program at Glen Iris and possibly one other elementary school. The Birmingham News announced that:
The first 1,000 computers, called XO laptops, are part of an initiative by Mayor Larry Langford and the Birmingham City Council to put laptop computers in the hands of first- through eighth-graders in the city school system.
Yet before anyone reaches for the champagne, remember this is a pilot program, the board has not accepted all 15,000 low-cost laptops that the city agreed to buy from OLPC. In addition, it will be a crash-pilot, from April 15 to September, that will need to show results by August, when the other 14,000 XO's are secluded to arrive from Quanta.
Then there's the cost. The Birmingham Weekly reports that:
The school system has estimated that setting up Glen Iris Elementary for the pilot program would cost as much as $30,000. Board member Phyllis Wyne questioned whether the $500,000 promised to the school system by the city would be enough to wire all 31 schools for the program.
The mayor’s office had proposed giving the computers to all students in the Birmingham schools, but Councilor Royal pointed out Thursday night that the funding is not enough to pay for that many computers. The city has agreed to buy 15,000 XO laptops from OLPC for $3,000,000. There are approximately 28,000 students enrolled in Birmingham schools - 13,000 more students than computers.
OLPC America would do well to give the Birmingham BoE some guidance and reassurance as to the costs of a school's infrastructure, or a full rollout to multiple schools. Better yet, OLPC America could work with the BoE to make sure its pilot assessment metrics can accurately measure impact in such a short time frame.
Future Illinois learningIllinois Low Cost Laptop Act
Now imagine a Birmingham program on a state-wide level. That's the dream of Illinois Lt. Governor Pat Quinn and his Low Cost Laptop Act:
The Children's Low-Cost Laptop Act (HB 5000)... would establish a statewide program to provide elementary school students in up to 300 schools with low-cost laptop computers for academic use. All elementary schools and school districts in Illinois would have the opportunity to submit an application for laptop funding.
"Laptops are the textbooks of tomorrow, and no Illinois child should be left on the wrong side of the digital divide," Quinn said.
OLPC News contributor and OLPC Volunteer Ed Cherlin
analyzed the finer points of the Act, and his results may surprise you:
As usual, the Devil is in the details. This [bill] says nothing about how to choose the laptops. Will the authorities decide to buy as much hardware as they can for $400 per unit? Or will they understand that the XO hardware and software are designed for the mission?
Furthermore the bill explicitly provides incorrect criteria for evaluating the project. The report must include the project's effect on:
- academic progress of students who are participating in the pilot project, as measured by performance on assessment instruments;
- student progress in schools or classrooms participating in the pilot project as compared with student progress in schools or classrooms not participating;
- student performance on assessment instruments required by the State Board;
Items 1 and 3 specify the use of standard tests for evaluating the program. If this bill becomes law, the education authorities will be prohibited from evaluating the children's interest in learning, whatever they learn outside the curriculum, or their progress in collaboration, independent learning, discovery, creativity, or problem-solving.
Several laptop programs in the US have been shut down because they did not evaluate any of these things, and produced no significant gains in standard test scores.
Ed concludes that the authors of the bill have little idea what One Laptop Per Child is about or its true promise for education. That there is a real need to educate political leaders on the full requirements and metrics of technology-empowered learning.
A future OLPC America leader?The need for OLPC America
Wasn't this the very role for OLPC America? To combine experts in education and legislative maneuvering that can show how education using the XO is supposed to work, teach a bit of it to the legislature and the public, and then make sure that that understanding informs any bill on the subject.
I will give OLPC Chicago great credit in getting the ball moving, and mad props to Mayor Larry Langford in making OLPC Birmingham happen.
But wouldn't both be helped by an active and visible OLPC America?
Tags: Low Cost Laptop Act | Lt. Governor Pat Quinn | OLPC America | OLPC Birmingham | OLPC Illinois | OLPC USA | XO Laptop |
