Information, please

If this is the information age, how do you explain so many legislators so seemingly confused about the details of Gov. Angus King’s laptop proposal? Whether Gov. King could have done a better job explaining how his plan would annually provide seventh-graders with laptop computers and teachers with training or whether legislators needed to do a better job listening is not the point now. A program this significant deserves time to be heard.

Funding. It has been popularly supposed that the laptop program for seventh-graders would spend $50 million. It does not. It would place that money, along with $15 million in private funds, into an endowment, using approximately $6 million a year from the endowment’s interest to fund the program. The $50 million remains and could be used elsewhere if the program does not work.

Evidence that computers are needed. Gov. King last week offered dozens of studies and examples of how and under what circumstances computers proved to be effective tools in classrooms and in learning generally. He presented too much material to list here but the conclusions were that, especially for higher order thinking skills and with properly trained teachers, students benefited noticeably. Consider that advanced classes would be available to the smallest schools, lab work could be done through computer models, the latest research rather than outdated textbooks would be available. The studies, by the way, are on the governor’s web site (www.state.me.us/governor/).

Don’t students already have computers? In most schools, they already have computer labs, where teachers struggle to make a few hours a week on the computers relevant to a curriculum that was designed on the assumption that no one has a computer. Are the computer labs sufficient to provide such a basic piece of equipment for learning? Would any school favor creating a pencil lab?

Maine’s other priorities. Maine lawmakers are acting as if the 2000 surplus is the first time they have seen excess cash in Augusta. Suddenly they want to patch every school roof, expand college scholarships, fully fund general-purpose aid to education and buy free prescription drugs for the elderly. These are all worthy goals. They were worthy goals when Maine had a surplus last year and the year before, but lawmakers didn’t have the itch to accomplish them until the governor proposed the computer endowment. If the endowment disappears, there’s a good chance the itch will too. In any event, the state is spending or is committed to spending more money for renovation now than ever in its history.

The proposal lacks support. Actually, it is gaining support by the day. Not only has National Semiconductor offered to provide teacher computer training for free, but the Maine Association of School Libraries has backed the idea. So has the Association of Computer Technology Educators of Maine. And so has Heather Blease, the founder of Maine-based EnvisioNet. And Seymour Papert, co-founder of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Media Lab and the MIT Artificial Intelligence Lab. And Bob Metcalfe, founder of 3Com and inventor of the Ethernet, John Sculley, former president of Pepsi and Apple, Warren Cook, president of the Jackson Lab, and David Shaw, president of Idexx. From Daniel Levesque, the vice president of operations at J. Paul Levesque & Sons sawmill in Ashland to Cheryl Steele Oakes, a computer teacher at Wells Elementary School, Maine people and computer experts are realizing that the proposal is a bold step in the right direction.

Hardly anyone doubts that computers will become more important in the lives of students over the next several years. Maine’s question is whether it will get a jump on other states or lag behind. This isn’t about handing students a frill. Across the country, schools are arming their students with these powerful learning devices to encourage them to take a more active part in their own educations. They are the tools of the present; the standard equipment for many careers now and of even more in the near future.

Certainly, questions remain about the governor’s proposal and, certainly, the computers it offers will evolve as the technology does. Gov. King needs to signal his willingness to be open to modifications. But given the small risk he is asking the Legislature to make — essentially holding tax money in an endowment — and the large potential rewards of the plan, it is difficult to believe lawmakers, given the details of the proposal, will not enthusiastically embrace it.