Laptops in School Raise Test Scores Dramatically, Privacy Non-Existent – Frontline
Frontline premiered a documentary called “Digital Nation”. In one segment, the vice-principle of Intermediate School 339, Bronx, NY, Dan Ackerman, demonstrates how he “remotely monitors” the students’ laptops for “inappropriate use”. (his demonstration begins at 4:36).
What really interested me about this short documentary is, while the students must give up privacy rights while using these laptops on school property (unlike the total invasion of privacy story that broke around mid February) this Bronx school seems to have gotten it right. Grade level improvements speak for themselves on a scholastic level that is.
On the other hand, the thoughts I wish to provoke from our readers are the following:
What is the price of modernization over personal space and privacy?
Has our society decided to move in the direction of a type of “life monitoring police”; in that only constant supervision will gain improvements in our scholastic systems?
Is this the innovation of a teaching mechanism or an evolution of the short attention span mind of our nation’s youth and their inability to focus without rapid fire interactivity to keep them stimulated sufficiently?
Dan Ackerman, vice-principal, stated:
“As long as they are doing their work, there is nothing wrong with them chatting, ….that’s what I see, a lot of the multitasking…”
According to him, freedom of speech is safe, for now. In the video (embedded at the bottom of this article) we can see that the children are aware that they can be monitored, specifically when the webcam begins to countdown as it is about to take a picture.
I captured a series of pictures from the video below that show this camera countdown after Mr. Ackerman requested the laptop take a picture of one of the students.
Notice how the smile at the 3 second mark…
…changes to a frowning grimace at the 2 second mark…
…then finally the student dashes to the side of the screen to avoid the picture being snapped.
It seems that not only does the student know what is happening, at another point in the video, the VP mentions confronting students about alternate laptop usage other than their schoolwork. He states that the students announced that they are also working on school projects simultaneously. The final result according to the school’s staff? “As long as the work is getting done, that is what matters.”
I wonder what would happen if the students were told that they are not permitted to move out of the way when the webcam is about to take a picture? If they were also told they are being cataloged and tracked to verify their whereabouts, and what exactly they were doing at all times. Doesn’t that sound a little like a minimum security prison?
My assumption is that these laptops are “locked down” from social networking and “MA only” areas of the Internet. Although, at one point in the video there IS a mention of a student editing their Facebook page. It isn’t known if this is occurring offline or not. Given the proper amount of freedom, yet having certain restrictions in place to avoid access to mature and less than moral locations of the net, along with the concept of multitasking in their own environment, seems to be very effective for motivating these children to want to learn.
The world is already fast paced, and the exponential increase of technology and social communication needs to continue inside of the classrooms, as it already does outside. Our school systems can not be trapped in some kind of time warp while the world flys by at faster and faster speeds of growth and development. At one point the principal equates having access to technology, with having access to air. Funny, I feel exactly the same way. Yet, if I was forced to be self aware of every minute mental choice, coupled with constant fear of my next action, and what exact words I had to use while I interact with this technology, that air would smell increasingly polluted.
The real question is, when does monitoring become and invasion of privacy even within the confines of school halls? When might a viewing of a conversation between two students, or an email between a student and their parent become an invasion of privacy? Most would say almost instantly. Especially when the message may be of a personal and private nature. So keep your personal communication to yourself at school. Good luck with that sentiment. In an average work environment is there absolutely no personal communication?
The sensitivity of children as they move into adulthood can be frightening, and very uncomfortable. Stresses arises during adolescence that if poked or prodded in the wrong way, could send a child in to a spiral of depression. Additionally, lashing out in destructive and negative ways might be considered even if it is actually a cry for help. A cry that societies’ newly invented teaching mechanism, carefully manipulated by those in power, may have introduced. This might sound extreme, but I am left asking, what are the rules of this game? And because I am a parent I want to know, who gets to make them?
The teachers themselves seems enthralled. Even elated at the developments unseen before these devices of instant communication came into play. One of the teachers that uses the laptops in her classroom stated:
“They are flourishing with laptops”
The principal ended his interview with this remark:
“We have to embrace the fact that our kids are going to need different skills five years from now than they needed five years ago. the world has sped up in a lot of ways and I think Education hasn’t.”
Where might this end up over time? 10 years from now will we need to sign contracts that allow for all keyboard button monitoring by an automated system that checks to see if you have used a swear word? Will webcams measure our pupil dialation to see of we are staring into the same spot for too long equating to non-productivity? Will we have our pulses monitored in order to make sure that we are not falling asleep on the job?
“The future is what we make it…”, a man named John Connor once said. I hope we don’t make it a miserable, big brother dominated, mess someday.
As seen originally on Gizmodo via Boing Boing.
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Filed Under: Innovation • Technology • Web Privacy
