|
April 15, 2001
Trend Watch by T&L Editors
A wireless makeover for calculators, E-Rate concerns, and new fingerprinting technologies for kids - get the skinny here.
E-Rate Funding Casualties
Our nation's poorest and smallest schools still aren't getting much-needed E-Rate funds, according to a recent Urban Institute study for the Department of Education. Experts cite paperwork and poverty as the culprits. Small schools say the 20 to 30 hours of application time aren't worth the few thousand dollars they'd receive.
Responding to complaints about bureaucratic application processes, the FCC and Universal Service Administrative Company have streamlined the E-Rate paper trail with online applications and free phone help. Nevertheless, schools with dated buildings and infrastructure not equipped to handle the high-speed Internet connections the E-Rate funds will still be out of luck.
A Calculated Move
Texas Instruments has joined the wireless fray with a handheld that's been in schools for years: the calculator. The company, betting on their longtime installed base in classrooms, recently launched TI-Navigator, a system that combines TI-83 Plus graphing calculators with local wireless networking. In this system, students plug their calculators into hubs on their desks, which are wirelessly linked to the teacher's computer. The teacher can then download curriculum material and lesson plans, send individual or group questions, and monitor student progress in real time. In what looks like a move to compete head-to-head with wireless solutions such as Palm, TI plans to offer content in language arts and social studies in addition to their mainstays: math and science. The system, now being piloted in a handful of schools, will be available in the fall.
Order of Fries with that fingerprint
From student information systems that let parents "log on" to their kids' latest quiz grades and attendance records to the "cookies" that track Web browsing habits, surveillance and supervision are now standard features of our digital age. But what about technologies that insure privacy and security? Enter biometrics, the technology of identifying people by physical characteristics, such as voice patterns and fingerprints. Biometrics is the technological infrastructure of POSitive ID, a student identification program now being test-driven in three Pennsylvania school districts, where students pay for school lunch with their fingerprints. Biometrics technology converts students' fingerprints into points on a grid, which are then transferred into numbers. The prints are thrown away, and the remaining number carries the weight of currency for a sea burger or side of tater tots.
Supporters of the technology contend that biometrics identification increases security and convenience by allowing only recognized users access to information and services. In the case of Pennsylvania's Lower Merion School District, biometrics fingerprinting means nobody knows who's getting a free or reduced price lunch, and only identified students can pay with their unique print. Already, computer notebooks include biometrics security options, and cell phones are next to offer this almost fail-proof authentication technology.
Read other articles from the April issue
Send a letter to the Editor in response to this article.
|
