T.H.E. News Update :: November 14, 2007

News & Issues

Kansas School District Rolls Out 1:1 MacBook Program

In one of the poorer districts in the Kansas City, KS metropolitan area--where more than 75 percent of students qualify for free or reduced-price lunches--administrators and school board members have launched a project to ensure that their students have all the technological advantages that wealthier students have in their education. The district serving that area, Kansas City, Kansas Public Schools (KCKPS), is giving every high school student and teacher a laptop for use in the classroom and at home--and not just any laptop, but the latest generation of Intel-based MacBook laptops from Apple, which were distributed to students Nov. 6 and 7 district-wide, about 5,400 systems total....

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Women Lose Ground in IT, Computer Science

Women are falling further behind in information technology and computer science, according to a new report released by the National Center for Women & Information Technology (NCWIT). The study, the NCWIT Scorecard, compiled data on girls and women in computer science and IT as students at the K-12 and post-secondary levels, as well as women working as professionals in IT and as faculty in computer science in higher education. It painted a fairly bleak picture of the situation in the United States, where women make up the drastic minority of participants in science- and technology-related studies and where that minority shrinks further the higher one looks up the academic and corporate ladder....

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ACLU Contests Cell Phone Policy at Colorado High School

The American Civil Liberties Union last month challenged the actions of the Monarch High School in Lafayette, CO, after school administrators confiscated a sophomore's cell phone after a school security officer accused him of smoking and parking in the wrong lot....

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Innovation First Brings Robotics to the Classroom

With robotics playing an ever more integral role in STEM education, Innovation First, the company behind a wide range of robotics initiatives, has launched a new online resource targeted directly toward K-12 and post-secondary education....

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Trillion, Optasite Launch Mobile Wireless Program

Wireless services provider Trillion has launched a partnership with Optasite, a mobile phone tower company, to "enhance mobile wireless communications and increase safety for school districts and their surrounding communities." The program aims to lease unused parcels of land within districts and provide revenues to them through the land lease while also increasing mobile coverage in surrounding areas....

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Mobile Educational Gaming To Triple by 2012

The market for mobile educational gaming will more than triple by 2012, according to a new forecast released late last week by research firm Ambient Insight. Demand for mobile educational gaming will expand at a compound annual growth rate of 26.5 percent over the next five years, with annual revenues expected to hit $185 million by 2012, up from the current $57 million....

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