Laptop advantage

Gov. John Baldacci made clear in Tuesday’s State of the State address that he believes in investing in Maine’s people. I’d like to join in his support of economic development and of education. Specifically, I believe as a state that we need to find a way to fund the continuation of the learning-with-laptop initiative, especially moving the project into our high schools.

I am a professor at the University of Maine at Farmington and have worked with many of the middle-school teachers throughout the state who are part of the initiative, and they have clearly disproven many of the fears that existed in the early stages of this project. The computers are being used to excite and engage students in learning their academics, they aren’t an expensive Gameboy, and although there are a handful of stories of students who have deliberately abused their laptops, there are 33,000 cases of students taking careful and mature care of theirs.

The Maine Education Policy Research Institute has shown there is evidence that student interest in school and learning has increased and behavior problems have decreased. My own research, conducted with the help of colleagues at the University of North Texas, looked at last year’s eighth-grade Maine Educational Assessment test scores. Of all the eighth-grade students, the only ones who have been part of the laptop initiative are those who were attending one of the nine exploration sites. Those students showed significantly higher test scores in math, science and social studies than the rest of Maine’s middle schools, even though the same schools scored much lower before the laptop initiative.

We’ve also conducted a case study of one of the Maine Learning Technology Initiative middle schools and found that students there showed a significantly higher attitude toward school than students in a comparison school in Texas. Further, students in the Maine school who did not have a computer at home and were not allowed to take a MLTI laptop home scored lower on computer skills, on attitude toward school, and on self-concept than other students.

More than just academics, this project represents a huge economic development initiative for the state. Education is everything to our future economy. We may not be able to identify what jobs will be important to Maine in the next 10 years, but I can say with certainty that they will involve both education and technology. Even two years ago, before the learning-with-laptop initiative, 34 percent of Maine’s work force needed to use a computer daily, but only 4 percent of students had daily access to technology.

Our students will be a trained and competent work force, helping to attract new jobs to Maine. We know other states will follow in Maine’s footsteps, regardless of what Maine chooses to do with the initiative. New Hampshire has announced it will have a laptop initiative similar to Maine’s, and Massachusetts is working on one, as well. Our students will have to compete with those students for jobs. I want Maine’s students to win.

We cannot afford to ignore the benefits this learning-with-laptop initiative has brought, not just to our students, but to all of Maine. We need to find a way to continue funding for the middle-school project, and to extend the project into our high schools.

Mike Muir is a professor of Middle Level Education and Educational Technology at the University of Maine at Farmington where he also directs a U.S. Department of Education Preparing Tomorrow’s Teachers to Teach Technology grant.