Colleen O’Connor: ‘Yes’ to eBooks in state classrooms

This spring’s budget session is messier than usual.

This is understandable given the near-death remedies proposed in Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s budget and the current state of the California economy.

What is infuriatingly common, however, is that the ritual is always the same. First, suggest cutting what people care most about (children, schools, health care, and safety). Next, wait for these and other more powerful constituencies to demonstrate and plead (unions, insurance companies, casinos). Then allow the politicians to find yet another rabbit in the hat. Finally, call a press conference to announce the newly found money and take the appropriate bows.

Notice how the San Diego school board recently managed to avoid all the announced potential teacher layoffs, school closings, and other “orange” level alert cuts, by simply adding a few more students to each classroom.

What is usually forgotten in this elaborate dance is the huge rise in civic cynicism such manipulation causes among the electorate. The latest special election results (a hammering of the status quo) should give all elected officials cause enough to stop this silly tango and begin doing their jobs.

A place they can start is by looking for new solutions to old problems; not old solutions to new problems.

For this, I give  Schwarzenegger some credit. Despite his participation in the latest budget circus, he has proposed some new solutions to some new problems, but received very little attention and/or support for his ideas.

One of the best of those ideas, in my opinion, was explained in repetitive “Our Wallet is Empty” speech.

Hidden behind the clouds of war that his “red alert” proposed cuts triggered, lay the suggestion that California become the first state in the Union to move to digital textbooks into our schools. The Governor had asked the State Board of Education to make textbooks available in digital formats, and he “expects the first science and math books to be digital by this fall.”

He made one mistake.

He tried to sell this idea as a way to save hundreds of millions of dollars. He should have told the larger truth. California is the birthplace of the tech industry. Without moving California students ahead, faster, in the digital age, we will sink further in the global marketplace. He should have said, “if it is good enough for Princeton, it is good enough for California!”

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Let me be more specific. Amazon and Sony have both developed and launched new electronic, wireless, reading devices or eBook readers; the Kindle DX and the Reader respectively. Both allow for wireless downloading of all books digital, including textbooks. The DX has a built-in dictionary, backlit screen for reading in direct sunlight, a larger screen, with note-taking and highlighting search capabilities. There is also the audible on-off switch for the sight impaired. [I discovered this product for my Aunt who has macular degeneration].

Both eReaders are sleek, user friendly, easy to access and lightweight—about 2 pounds. The Kindle DX (available for shipping on June 10th) is currently the leader in the field, but to keep its edge, it is partnering with Princeton University, the University of Virginia’s Darden School of Business, Case Western Reserve University, Arizona State University, and Oregon’s Reed College—-all prestigious academic institutions.

Here is the draw that the Governor missed. These schools are receiving the Kindle DX, FREE, for their students as part of a new Amazon education outreach program. Every major technology company knows digital books are the future, and they are attempting to infiltrate the classrooms, (much like Microsoft and PCs did in previous decades) in order to simultaneously guarantee a solid customer base for future sales, to refine and update their products (using the students as test subjects), and to make the product “cool.” Despite Apple’s early entry to the classroom market, PCs and Microsoft eventually overtook them.

Every tech company is executing this strategy now. Duke University has offered iPODS to its entering freshman class. Indiana University provided special student deals for Blackberrys, and now Princeton is receiving free Kindle DXs, as well as the requisite teacher training, third party surveys, and online research materials.

I repeat, if it is good enough for Princeton, why not California’s students? And why should they wait until college? Our high school students are dropping out from boredom; our teachers are buckling under tedious and tiresome curricula, more outdated than the Studebaker, and our state is falling behind in multiple categories. Throw in obsolete texts vs. the allure of twittering, blogging, rapping and Facebook, and you realize the imperative of eBooks in the classroom.

Surely, the Governor can approach these competing eBook vendors and suggest California’s most willing teachers, administrators, school districts, and community colleges, as lab participants for their Education Outreach Programs. The competition, the advertising, the federal tax credits, and all important bragging rights, should bring more than one tech company to the table. Kindle DX, Sony’s Reader, a rumored Apple notebook Jumbo eReader (LCD), and other lesser known competitors would love such an auspicious entry into California’s market.

Add to this the potential to manufacture the products in California, (think jobs and revenue); the surge in student interest (think fewer dropouts); the incredible lightness of carrying a 2 lb. instrument instead of a 20 pound backpack; as well as the environmental savings of paperless texts, and you glimpse the future. As for the cost, a best selling book downloads in less than 60 seconds on a Kindle DX, and sells for $9.99 instead of bookstore costs of $25 or more! Imagine the savings for a math or chemistry textbook.

I know the complaints. I understand the reluctance of parents and teachers to try something new. After all, a book is a book. It needs pages, paper, covers, and heft to be understood. But surely, we have moved beyond the school days when a hand bell was rung to get you to class, a book was opened to sleep over, and a candle was used for illumination.

Furthermore, every school, every district, and every administrator knows I write the truth. They also know that there are just as many self-starters, adventurers, and forward looking teachers who would welcome the chance to seize the future and help their students—if only they were asked. Find them, encourage them, and let them lead. And provide them with the means to succeed.

With a little foresight, a lot of courage, and some help from the Governor’s office, we should be able to hustle some free eBooks, save some money, excite some students, and redeem California’s future.

Or we can hang around for the next spring dance, watch the food fights, and wonder how we lost to China, while we “wait for the mother ship to arrive”.

Colleen M. O’Connor is a former college history professor, the director of the “Faces of San Diego 2000″ family photographic history project and co-editor of Eleanor Roosevelt: An American Journey.  She is an SDNN political columnist and can be reached at CoConnor15x(a)Yahoo.com

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This entry was posted on Monday, June 22nd, 2009 at 9:08 am and is filed under Columns, Education, Lifestyle, Local News . You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.