Walton grant to furnish students with laptops
Posted on Wednesday, May 14, 2008
CHERRY VALLEY — State Rep. Jerry Brown of Wynne stood in the Cross County School District’s high school gymnasium Tuesday and suggested a new mascot for the rural school district of 700 students.
“You should be called the Ghosts,” he said to a group of about 350 assembled students, whose school moniker is the Thunderbirds. “You are rising out of the ashes.” Two of the three schools in the district, encompassing farm fields and rural communities between Cherry Valley, Hickory Ridge and Wynne, failed to meet the state’s achievement requirements on state tests in recent years.
To help the district meet those standards and to prepare students better for technological jobs after graduation, the Walton Family Foundation announced Tuesday that it would give a $ 240, 000 grant to provide laptop computers to 330 students in grades seven through 12. Brown was among the speakers at the announcement.
The grant will expand an earlier initiative by the district to provide an Apple computer to each pupil in the fourth, fifth and sixth grades, Superintendent Matt McClure said.
Few school districts provide laptop computers to students.
The neighboring Wynne School District in Cross County supplies 360 laptop computers to students in grades to nine through 12 during the school day. They can also check out the computers overnight from the school library, said Darrell Smith, the superintendent.
In the Sheridan School District, students whose rides on school buses run long through rural Grant County have laptops, as well as Internet connections on the buses, so they can study on trips to and from home.
Under the 24 / 7 One-to-One program announced Tuesday, each Cross County School District student in seventh through 12 th grades will receive a laptop computer upon enrollment in school next fall. The students keep the computers throughout the school year, returning them at the close of school in May 2009.
Two private organizations also donated an additional $ 50, 000, making the total money available for the computer program $ 290, 000.
The Thunderbird Foundation, a local organization aimed at improving the Cross County School District, donated $ 10, 000.
Chris and Claudette Barber of Vanndale donated $ 40, 000.
“We never had anything like this,” Claudette Barber, who graduated from Wynne High School and whose daughter is in the eighth grade in the Cross County district, said of the computers.
“We want to help all that we can,” added husband Chris Barber.
“This will change the landscape of Cross County schools,” McClure said of the new computers. “Instead of teachers giving [students ] information, we want the students to create their own knowledge.” According to state Department of Education figures, Cross County School District’s elementary school pupils, on average, scored at proficient and advanced levels on the Arkansas Benchmark math exams for 2006-07, the year students received the computers. They scored higher than did their classmates in the upper grades.
Cross County fourth-, fifthand sixth-graders also fared better than junior high school students on the Iowa Test of Basic Skills science test that was administered in the spring of 2007. Students in each elementary grade, on average, scored at least at the 51 st percentile; seventh-, eighth- and ninth-graders scored lower; on average, they did not rise above the 40 th percentile on the science test. The 50 th percentile is the national average.
The use of laptop computers has drawn mixed reaction.
In Maine, the state’s Department of Education provided its 15, 000 seventh- and eighth-graders in public schools with laptops six years ago.
“We find it to be very successful,” said David Connerty-Marin, director of communications for the Maine Department of Education. “We have studies showing that, academically, students’ grades have improved in all areas, especially in writing.” The state of Maine pays $ 289 a year per computer for leasing it and for its upkeep, he said.
But Larry Cuban, a Stanford University education professor emeritus, wrote in an article in Education Week that crediting laptops for increasing tests scores is like giving credit for a student’s musical talent to the piano rather than the music teacher.
“When initial gains in test scores occur, they are attributed to laptops, not to what and how the teacher teaches,” he wrote.
The Cross County School District disagrees. The district applied for the Walton grant. The Walton Family Foundation was created to honor Sam and Helen Walton, the founders of Wal-Mart.
The foundation focuses on educational improvement in schools, economic development of the Arkansas Delta, conservation of marine and freshwater environments, and improving the quality of life in Northwest Arkansas.
Cross County School Board President Richard Imboden said that when he first heard of the grant for computers, he feared the worst. “My first impression was that we’d see a huge increase of laptops in every pawnshop around,” he said, indicating students would sell the computers rather than use them.
“But we’ve seen other districts around the country use them for discipline and for learning. There’s no vandalism, no theft. The students are so pleased to have them. They are their prized possessions,” he said.
Imboden said he was concerned about the cost to replace the computers when they become obsolete in four or five years.
“Maybe the state will recognize how successful they’ve become and help maintain them in schools,” he said.
The new laptop is a welcome addition for Zack Hill, a 10 thgrader at Cross County High. Hill, a pitcher for the Thunderbirds baseball team, said he has six universities, including collegiate baseball-powerhouse Louisiana State University, interested in recruiting him.
“I’ll be able to read about each college and learn more before I pick a school,” Hill said.
Kanisha Walker, who will graduate this month, plans to attend school in Little Rock to become a dental assistant.
“This will help us improve and prepare for future,” she said. Information for this article was contributed by Cynthia Howell of the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette.
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