Arizona school ditches texts for laptops

An Arizona high school is set to become one of the first ebook-only schools, as it preps to hand out laptops to 350 students this fall. The cost for the laptops at Vail High School will be about $850 per student, compared to about $600 for textbooks. The school plans to supplement electronic versions of traditional textbooks with online articles assigned by teachers. Meanwhile, we assume the students are already planning for in-class LAN parties over the school's WiFi network. (Oh, and that's Vail, Arizona, not Colorado, so don't even think about moving there if your plans are to get a free lappie and hit the slopes.)

[Thanks, Kevin]

[Jeff @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

Uh, yea. What's the tech support cost on a textbook? How often do you need a new Li-Ion cell? Do textbooks fail to boot after you drop your backpack?

Also, don't you still have to buy the text even if you don't buy the book? That knowledge surely isn't free. Their cost comparrison seems invalid in this regard.

[paultakeda @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

Access to online journal articles may be done through a license for the entire school. It probably isn't that expensive.

I see this as a good thing. Textbooks were expensive and completely useless after a few short years. Not to mention heavy.

Besides, I don't mind the expense if it clearly benefits education. (which it does)

[Casual Observer @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

Yes, let's all be Luddites.
Back to scraping on rocks, because wasn't that the truly effective way?

Aren't rocks easier to maintain than flimsy paper that has to be made by people?
Won't rocks weather better and not have to be kept indoors?
And after all, don't you still have to aquire the information to print on this "paper"?

The cost comparison of using paper over rocks seems invalid in this regard.

LOL, welcome to the future. -and the planet.

[Walter E. Wallis @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

$800 per student?
Somebody didn't check the Frys' ads. With a retail or $499, wholesale should be under $300. Injah is working on a $100 laptop.
of course, they might have picked Apples, but if they did they severely limited the available software.
Royalties must be paid on material, but printers and binders are put out of the picture. Chiropractors also lose customers when kids no longer need to carry 40 pounds of books around.

[Tyler @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

If the laptops are not given to the students, but are kept year to year, really the only cost would come the first year. The rest of the lifespan of the laptops would be toward maintenance (new batteries, new HDD, reinstall OS, etc), and not replacing worn books. Also the school could enter a contract with the parents saying that if the laptop is damaged beyond reasonable wear, then they would have to pick up the brunt of the tab.

[Jeff @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

You folks may not have the same school funding issues in your area that we do. It's not about laptops not being more useful than books. I don't know how schools can justify this expense.

My local schools have books that are as much as twenty years old, or older. Imagine making the investment in laptops, and then not being able to refresh them every few years. Books don't die. Electronics do.

I'd love to see what happens when the laptops are needing lots of repairs, and the local school levy fails to pass!

I'm all for the future, but let's fix what's broken before we spend a bundle on what't next.

[wxrman @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

...and at what cost for IT at EACH school that has to maintain the broken screens, viruses, filled hard drives with porn, video games, etc. etc. etc.

it's another hard lesson in why a cheap, simple, book is better.

College students... who are financially liable for the units... SURE!

Irresponsible high school kids... no way.

[paultakeda @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

The $800 per student may actually not just be for hardware, but takes into account the licenses for online content.

[yuppicide @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

This is a really stupid idea. Everyone here is right about the maintaince costs. If these kids were like my friends when I was younger then these laptops would be broken pretty quick. People rip off the keys and rearrange them on the keyboard.

It's much easier to have extra copies of a book on hand incase one gets lost or vandalized, but to have a bunch of laptops on hand.. not so cheap.

[Fred @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

probably using Appple because IT can control installations and content much easier. Will probably give the kids "Standard" accounts which doesn't allow them to install drivers or software without an admin password. The other benefit is the lack of viruses in the mac world. And as far as having a lasting and stable product, Apple can't be beat. I've had a working ibook for almost 5 years with zero problems. In the long run an ibook is more cost effective and more flexible than an stack of books.

[Arthur @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

ebay is probably happy about this...

[Kent @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

Um. How much do the e-books cost? I think the publisher will have something to say about handing out their textbooks for free.

[RobERT @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

No computers for any students.
Seriously.
Make students write their reports by hand.
Computers = toys for students.
just distractions....

Uh---Miss Smith, my laptop battery is dead. Again.

[Samuel @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

Why is this such great news, my public high school provided every student (2000 kids) in the school with an iBook at no charge.

[Matt Deckman @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

My school system WAS the first to adopt the laptop program. We get iBook G3s and G4's every year. I am located in an inner ring suburb of Cleveland. We also won the Intel Technology award last year. Please include in your article.

[JD @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

Yea we got iBooks the first year I went to high school. they cost $50 a year for tech suppor and such. Now in my county everyone from high schoolers to elementary school kids have laptops from the school. It was awesome until they blocked everything and next year everyone gets Dells.

[coward @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

How is this not a caption contest? That kids got the most wooden 'Boy, I sure am thinking hard look!' ever. Come on people.

[late to the party @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

#2- I work in a laptop "enhanced" school. We use both e-book and traditional. Trust me, textbooks last WAY longer than laptops.
#12- On one level, you are right. However, there is always the instance of, " Mister, what does X mean?" and I can say, "I don't really know, look it up."

[mzhao @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

I say this is a very good thing, for the students at least. First and most obviously, a ~6 pound laptop beats a ~16 pound pile of textbooks. Also, you'll notice the inherent benefits of ebooks, such as quick searching, hyperlinks to related articles, etc. Laptops are also more, um, motivating than books in that a student can conduct research that much faster and easier.

As for tech support issues, why don't you just let the students pay for support? Like JD said, his school charges $50 a year for support and such. As for high schoolers being irresponsible, I've seen junior high students who know not to abuse electronics no matter how "fun" or tempting it might be. With the (supposedly) adequete computer education programs that are supposedly standard in most schools in the US, I don't think that any student won't be able to at least log in and open Acrobat or OpenOffice or something. Schools can place restrictions into the laptops quite easily.

About RobERT's "dead battery" thing, wouldn't a school have thought of that and included surge protectors/wall jacks near each desk?

[CH @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

Schools often get technology grants from organizations or the government that can only be spent on technology. That is why you often see them spending in what appears to a frivolous fashion on computers or other tech items. They either spend it on some technology or lose it.

The problem is that no one wants to donate money for textbooks or smaller class sizes. It just isn't as sexy as donating money for a thousand laptops.

There is something to be said for replacing textbooks though. While the books themselves can easily last for 20+ years the information inside begins to get outdated immediately. I wouldn't be surprised if they were replaced every 10 years (or even sooner).

Moving to a subscription model where the school pays a much smaller yearly fee for the software version of a textbook might make financial sense. Schools wouldn't get hit with a large upfront cost for the textbooks which would appeal to administrators. Plus, the school gets a new updated version of the text every year.

If the school is paying for the computers with a technology grant then it is possible that it could be cheaper than buying traditional textbooks. It might even make sense when you consider the support and maintainence costs, but I could see that as an area that school administrators could misjudge badly.

[Daryl @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

wow every response is wrong, if the schools bought laptops for the students, they could easily secure the ibooks, with macosx, limited user mode works great. Also reading on a laptop is easier for most people than reading a book. Also if the students were responsible for the costs of the laptops (just like they are responsible for the costs of the books) then its not a problem. I am sure that things like a broken screen or cosmetic damage are the only things the kids would have to pay for.

things like logic boards, batteries, and other stuff internal is covered by the school and applecare.

[spike117 @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

Id be much more worried about giving a bunch of adults laptops then kids. Children are born with these things, when I was in kindergarten I was using computers. I mean at least kids wont be asking stupid questions like "how do I send an email" or "whats a mouse", "why if I press print more then once because the computer is slow it prints it more then once? I only wanted one copy and I can't get my head around the fact that I only need to press print once. I should be considered mentally retarded"

[Nick @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

Like any collective purchase, the "not greatest price in the world" price that this school has to pay per laptop probably includes other nicities that we the individual users never see. Things like complete service plans, quick replacement policies, upgrade plans, lease agreements (for upgrading the systems later), insurance against damage or theft (remember this is a school, not a secure and relatively mature office), and software licensing.

Not going with the merchant who just happens to have the lowest price RIGHT NOW, but going with a merchant who offers all those additional options and who GUARENTEES that same low price for a period of time into the future is the way to go if you are buying in volume.

[Adam Lange @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

My school district has done a similar thing for all 7th grade students. Every 7th grade studuent got an iBook, and of course the rooms were fitted with airports etc. This has been going on for two years now, and its been going very welll. Yes, there are of course some instences of broken lcds and other problems, however they are covered by insurance (I'm not sure of all the details), and the laptops with just broken lcds find plenty of other uses. Some of them are hooked up to external displays at my highschool for video editing, and are a great improvement over the much older iMacs we use to use.

[ciupi @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

yeah right, then the school have to spend millions in paper because everyone (like me) would like to print the ebook.

[Admiral @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

DRM IS EVIL!!!!!
sorry I had to say that :)
I *never* buy my textbooks from the bookstore! I save 50-75% buying books online second hand by using the addall.com search to find the cheapest prices.

This following semester I could not find one book (even in print!) because the new edition had literally just come out and amazon did not stock it and addall did not find it. I bought it online from prentice hall for $48 (regular paper price $120). cheap yes?

Well the DRM sucks!
I can ONLY use it on the computer that I downloaded it on (so I wont be able to put it on my PDA) because the stupid thing associates itself with a particular UID and hard drive serial number - so if my computer crashes the book is GONE!

I could have bought the online version, but that only allows me to print out once, but I have access to it everywhere. I just decided to go to my computer lab immediately after I bought it and printed out a copy.

DRM IS EVIL!
I hope someone comes up with a crack because I bought this thing fair and square and I dont like these limitations - end of rant

[OddManOut @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

Won't this mean the end of the school library ? Think people...WHAT WILL BECOME OF THE DEWEY DECIMAL SYSTEM !!??!!??!!??!!

:)

Seriously, I've got kind of mixed feelings about this. Once when I was in 10th grade, my english teacher offered unlimited extra credit for finding and submitting newspaper articles that included vocabulary words...5 points each. Maybe 6 of us were online and savy enough to acquire enough articles for A grades with NO additional work that term (this was about 3 weeks into 4th quarter). When I came to class with my first batch of 22 articles (and my tech bretheren/sisteren came similarly equipt), the product of 20 minutes work, the other students were outraged. And rightly so. I had an unfair advantage...and by god I was going to milk it for all it was worth :)

True, they could have gone to the public library or even the school library and paid the nominal printing fees and had basically the same advantage, but I think there's something to be said for ACTIVELY leveling the playing field and actually providing the students with what they need.

Eventualy my teacher capped the extra credit at 30 points and only 15 of them could come from the internet the rest had to be newsprint clippings or at least photocopies, and two students could not submit the same article regardless of the source.

I just kind of think it's dangerous to get people over dependant on computers...well *ever*...but particularly in the high school years. I think there's something to be said for doing things the old fashioned way.

That said, it's not a *terrible* idea. Earlier posters are right that while you might not want people overly dependant on computers, any IT proffessional will tell you that in modern society you don't want people completely computer illiterate either ("Where's the 'ANY' key ???" ). But I also agree that enough teenagers are sufficiently irresponsible that this will quickly become a problem.

Not to mention how malicious teenagers can be. Yeah, you might say 'if EVERYONE has one there is no real reason to steal them.' yes/no ? Well, aside from stealing other peoples and selling them (which some young thugs would undoubtedly be smart enough to do) some students will take them simply to deprive their legitamite user of them. I had my backpack with all contents stolen twice in school. On other occasions, 3 Scientific calculators and 1 graphing calculator, and my binder wre all stolen piecemeal. The calcs I never saw again. The rest was eventually found in various states of defacement. We didn't even have lockers because they kept getting broken into so much that they just ripped them all out the year before I went to high school (and live in the suburbs). I was not popular, but I wasn't hated enough to think I was specifically targeted. It was just random cruelty. And for my money, a laptop in a public high school is a big glowing target, for all kinds of nefarious activity.

Just think about this. Now, as these kids walk home with their lightened backbacks and their slick new way of learning, everyone on the street who sees them will know each one of them has an $800 lappy in their backpack. If people are getting mugged for $400 iPods...

It could get messy, even without telltale earbuds...

Personally, I think if they're gonna do this, it should be nation wide (probably with federal funds). Have Dell and Apple work together to each design 2 models. One each for K - 6, and 7 - 12. I suppose you can invite MS to join the party and come up with a Windows XP-S(cholastic), sufficiently crippled so students will have a hard time abusing them and people outside of the highschool environment will not particularly ENJOY using them. Make them ruggedized and sufficiently cross compatible so that different states and maybe even districts can choose whichever manufacturer they want without keeping the students from intereacting technologically with a reasonable amount of ease.

It would have to be nationwide cause that's the only way it would be cheap enough to afford and still be worth it for the manufacturers. I Just think an off the shelf product is probably not a good fit for public school. They need to be unapealing for theft, difficult to abuse, and hearty enough to survive at least 1 - 2 years. And as far as I know, no such animal exists in the wild...

I suppose it would never really work on that large a scale though. I mean, they'd have to retrain many of the TEACHERS to work with this new system, and right now they can't even afford to pay decent enough wages to keep profcient teachers around or to train new ones to a good level of proficiency.

I dunno. I huess all I can say in the end is I'm glad I'm out of public school, but I do worry for my children (should I ever have any)...

[OddManOut @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

To: Admiral

(Legal disclaimer: the following my be construed as instructions for criminal activity and are NOT advised. They are provided here simply for educational purposes. The instructions are implemented at the users OWN RISK)

Now that that's out of the way...

If you can print it at least once, perhaps you *could* try redirecting it to a file...a DRM free file (similar process to analog recapture of Napster 2.0 files). There is software available for creating PDF's from $50 - $100. 'PDF Exchange' would be one option as it automatically installs a PDF print driver (ie it shows up in Windows as another printer, but when you select it and print to it a box pops up and asks you where to put the new PDF file).

It might be a steep intro cost, but if you've got a few more years in college it might be worth it in the long run if eBooks become necessary. Plus, being able to produce your own PDF's is good in general.

I have used this software only on PC's with Windows 2000/XP. Don't know about using Macs or Linux (but I actually think Redhat 8.0/higher either does or used to come with such abilities bundled)

Hope this helps...text books are one of the WORST rackets in all of acedemia. At the JC the textbook often costs twice the enrollment fee per class. WTF ?!?!?!?

[TVGenius @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

From what I've heard, one of the reasons for this choice was that they wanted to encourage the teachers to not just run through the same textbook material every year. Here in Arizona, students must pass the AIMS test before they can graduate, and there have been lots of concerns over the difficulty of the test. School districts have re-written some of their curriculum to match what's required by the AIMS test to make up for that.

Perhaps they're looking to avoid the textbooks AND the text inside them altogether, and go an entirely different route with the material covered, as one of the complaints has been that some of the material on the AIMS test isn't sufficiently covered by the same old generic textbooks.

[adam @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

hay we all got laptops here at our 6th form in London. Its wicked, we do use for studying but most of the time we use them for leisure.

[Zeke @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

My school tried it when it was an upstart of 50 kids. In the past four years, it has over quadrupled in size.
We didn't touch the laptops last year.
They're way too expensive in the first place, and then they're a nightmare to repair (trust me, my best friend is the one who has to fix 'em).

Plus, who puts expensive, fragile equipment in the hands of every teen in a high school? Sure, I'm careful with the over-$1000-worth of tech I take to school every day, but I'm careful because I spent my *own* money on it, and don't want to pay for it to be repaired. If you hand a kid something expensive for free, they aren't going to worry much about how safe it is.

Books haven't gone obsolete in.... how many milennia now?

However, I would love the idea of e-books for college texts. They're waaaay too expensive. Just make them available to people who buy their own laptop.

[Zeke @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

I did a little extra "research..."
Vail High School is located in the University of Arizona Science and Technology Park.

That's probably how they can pull this off.

[No_ebooks @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

I recently graduated from a certain dental school in the US that has implemented electronic books. Let me tell you how horrible ebooks are. Our class was required to purchase an Apple laptop computer. I have no problems with the requirement for purchase of laptops; it is useful for email, taking notes, downloading powerpoints etc. However our school required us to purchase a DVD published by VitalSource that has many textbooks on there. Everyone initially thought it would be a one time cost of 1500 a year. Oh no. It turns out that we had to rent the books on DVD at 1500 a year. DVDs are replaced every year with supposedly newer textbooks, but most of the time the DVDs contain same textbooks with old manuals from previous years (which you still found useful) deleted. The vitalviewer program to view the textbooks is very buggy; it always crashes when I need it. Adobe Acrobat stomps all over vitalviewer. Upon graduation and after 6000 spent on "books," your DVD is supposed to be unlocked and free for use without expiration. Mine is still expired and I haven't bothered to figure it out. In reality only a minority of our class used the DVD. Most printed out text they needed or like myself, simpy purchased the textbooks needed. I paid perhaps 500 or so for textbooks that I found vital to have. I have used my $6000 DVDs for maybe a total of 10 hours or so my entire 4 year doctoral program. In fact some schools (including one graduating class in my school) have sued the manufacturer. Perhaps my class and I have been too far in our education and too used to paper to have ebooks forced upon us. Perhaps if ebooks were introduced earlier in the education process (and better software provided), it would work better.

[Laine @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

Properly managed, this could be the best innovation for schools since the cafeteria. Improperly managed... well, let's just say it would be bad. And who is surprised this happened first in Arizona?

[No_ebooks @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

Regarding the cost for maintenance of laptops...My school has a full time tech guy that repairs laptops. We are also required to purchase insurance on our laptops (insurance covers everything including being stupid and driving over your laptop...which has happened). The tech guy is always busy. Laptops are always breaking left and right. The school has loaner computers, but not enough since so many computers break.

[aelso @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

Oh, for goodness sake. A school tries to do new ideas and all the comments here seem to be "This is a dumb idea"

This is why I sometimes don't like reading comments on Engadget.

Of course I'm not saying this is a brilliant idea, but schools shouldn't be afraid of doing things like this.

[Admiral @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

A school tries to implement a tired idea that has been shown as a failure! To read ebooks you need a device (in this case a laptop), to use this device you need power. With paperbooks all you need is the book plus daylight (or a AAA battery and a mini nightlight of $25 value).

If you dont want to lug the laptop with you what will you do? The DRM as proven in my case is TOO restrictive, it is so restrictive that it infriges on my rights as a user. If you want to put it on a PDA - um..sorry you cannot do that.

Some people pointed out that they paid $1500 per year on books!
Even IF I bought books at the bookstore at full value, I would only pay $600 maximum per year- this is price gouging! When I get my books at add all, I payd maximum $300 per year. Compare those costs.


By the way :) thanks for the help with trying to get a DRM free version of my ebook :) I am on OS X and there is native print-to-PDF - but the adobe reader has dissabled this feature :mad: so I cannot do it. - I might consider buying the full versions (academic price of course) of Adobe Acrobat to see if it works.

so lets recap:
To get full utilization of ebooks you need:
laptop (>$1000) + PDA ($300) if no DRM problems + book cost ($6000 worst case schenario) + paper + toner cost for printing out
so you are looking at a MINIMUM of $7500

To use regular books:
$2400 (for the books) + $100 for batteries and a light + $30 for magic markers/pens
So, a minimum of $2500...hmmmm lookie at that - I just saved 5 grand! AND I get to resel my books if I want to AND I get to mark the heck out of them and read in any environment - WOW!

[Moosey @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

I know Kevin! And I like iBooks.

[pauline @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

Well, from the comments, I'm guessing that it's all Apple notebooks in the program. Does anyone else think that perhaps Apple is giving these schools a huge price break in exchange for exposing these students to Apple products? In the end, when they graudate and are looking for notebooks for college, the likelihood that they'll buy Apple laptops are higher because it's what they were exposed to.

[Billy @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

This is great, get a laptop for going to school. Then after you get it, hack it so you have full access to all the regular admin privilages on the lappie and then figure out a way to still get your precious e-books. That would take me about most of a Saturday. This is just another excuse for schools wasting tax-payers money. You don't need to carry a ton of books around either, that's what a locker is for.

[Austin @ Dec 19th 2005 1:36AM]

I think its awesome that they are getting apples, i wish i went to that school. I live in AZ but not near that school. I think i would cause more trouble than good with the ibooks, i wonder if they would let you use your own powerbook?