Katrina Schwartz said
Many students at [Los Angeles Unified School District’s Roosevelt High School] felt the news media had mischaracterized their school and its students as criminals for figuring out how to get around the iPad’s security features, often to access educational information.
“We were really caught up in how they kept calling Roosevelt ‘hackers,’” said Daniela Carrasco, a former student.
…
[Mariela] Bravo doesn’t understand why the district would give students iPads with so many limitations. Her peers were looking up homework help on YouTube – and yes, checking Facebook, too – but that’s part of life.
“They have to trust us more,” Bravo said. “We could surprise them and they could see that we are good kids.”
Students were frustrated that the district couldn’t see that negotiating distractions on the Internet is part of life now. “We should have been trusted with those websites,” Carrasco said. “Instead of blocking them, there should have been emphasis on how to use those websites for good.”
More nuanced responses from the students than the district…
Image credit: criminals crew_07, Phiesta’s way
I am often taken aback by the disconnect between technology use in schools and in real world. Schools are supposed to be teaching kids skills and knowledge for adult world, but whenever any new technology arrives, instead of teaching kids how to get the most out of it, our kneejerk reaction is to ban it. Cell phone policy: we ban phones, though not one of us could manage without our own smartphones for a day; internet: we tried for years to turn it off, to block it or limit access or cripple it somehow though it is often basic to everything people do in the real world. 3D printers show up, and our immediate reaction is to ban them, lest kids print out a weapon. I sometimes feel the only reason schools moved on from stone tablets is that we were afraid kids would use the chisels on each other. It is an odd view of children, not as innocents to be protected (as is often claimed to be the motivation), but as carriers of original sin just waiting for an outlet.