“Cry Freedom!” Cry for a Return of the Personal Computer

I guess that when I put more than a couple of minutes into a comment, I may as well take full credit and post it here. Credit goes, however, to Miguel Guhlin, and his latest T&L Blogerati post, Cry Freedom. The Mousing Around author describes how blogging and surveillance software is used to protect us and our students, but the results are a crippling of our technology.

Then, regular commenter, Cheryl Oakes, points out something that stuck a cord with me. She says,

I don’t want to learn the language of programmers, I don’t want to have to think about what happens in the background of the sytsem I am operating. However, this is the wakeup call for me to include more discussions about technology ethics and how we are all part of this new system.

Very clear and too the point. I guess that all I’ve done i to expand on her notions. You can read them, or toss them out with the rest of the varbage.

I agree with what Cheryl says, that the answer is in making the ethical use of information part of using information. It’s why I include Ethics as one of the four elements of the basics, when I describe contemporary literacy. The blocking measures implemented by school districts, and in the case of the U.S., by federal law, is merely a Band-Aid — and Band-Aids aren’t bad, as a temporary measure. But at the risk of sounding like a left wing, bleeding heart, liberal (haven’t said that in a while), the solution is to understand and then erase the behavior, not wall it off. In a rapidly changing, technology-rich world, we’re just going to have to keep making thicker and thicker walls, and this gets us no where.

I clearly remember the days, when a computer in a teacher’s classroom was the teacher’s. She could install what ever software she could get her hands on. One of the popular features of the earliest incarnations of most most ISTE affiliates was a disk of public domain software that was given out at their meetings. Today, you have to go through what seems like a mindless bureaucracy to get software installed on your computer. To be fair, there are good reasons for this. Our tech support staffs are shrinking when they should be growing, and Band-Aids are needed to prevent crippling breakdowns of our technology. So along with teaching the ethical use of information, we should also dramatically increase our tech staff so that schools and teachers can be free to experiment, innovate, and turn their computers back into the tools they’re designed to be — a personal computer.

2¢ Worth

4 thoughts on ““Cry Freedom!” Cry for a Return of the Personal Computer”

  1. I agree that ethics is absolutely an essential component of information literacy. “Just because you CAN doesn’t mean you SHOULD,” is something I often say in my classroom.

    I often talk about the arguments hackers make. “Well, I”m hacking to make them patch their software.” I parallel that to someone saying “Well,I’m throwing a brick through this window because they need to strengthen the glass.”

    Many hackers have hidden behind their intelligence and use cerebral, vague arguments for what they are doing. The bottom line is that the ends does not justify the means. Morality and ethics must come to the Internet and until it comes to the users of the Internet it is unlikely it will come to the Internet itself.

    It is our responsibility as educators to discuss and teach the ethics that will allow our students to be PROductive and not DEstructive users of the Internet.

  2. David, I think this loops back to the concept of innovation, or lack thereof in schools. How can teachers discover or create new innovative technologies when someone in the main office decides what software and web applications can be used on their computer? And if teachers can’t innovate, how can they lead students to innovation?

    I’ve spoken with teachers in districts at the extreme of this concept – thin client PCs. You can’t even hook up a digital camera and download pictures. The computer is reduced to a simple multi-tool, with just those tools that the IT department thinks they need. (“Why do you need a Philips-head screwdriver? Philips-head screws aren’t in our standards, so you shouldn’t have any in your classroom.”) The worst part of all is how demeaning it is. Teachers are being very explicitly told that their opinion on technology is not relevant, and that better informed people (usually with no experience as educators) will decide when, what, and how technology will be used in their schools. The result is a locked-down commodity appliance focused on basic productivity software, student records, and email.

    Maybe we need to create a new term to reflect these crippled computers – the IPC (ImPersonal Computer).

  3. ConnMC,

    I don’t know how teachers in such an environment are going to be flexible enough to innovate as technology innovates. Some standards I’ve seen still have teachers spending a considerable amount of time discussing floppy disks.

    In the business world I was always a big believer of decentralization. Decentralization and empowerment of local managers meant increased competitiveness and effectiveness. Centralization meant bureaucracy and frustration. I think that decentralization is vital.

    In business I hired the best and then I left them alone to do their job. I gave them the tools, the encouragement, and the training to stay on top of their game. I think we need more of that in education.

    I’m a lucky one in that my husband has a good job and supports my “teaching habit” so that I could leave the business world to teach. I’m in a “decentralized environment.” My wish is that other educators across the nation could get the opportunity that I have in my classroom to innovate.

    It saddens me to hear your story.

  4. OK, let’s consider the extreme other end of the spectrum. districts get out of the business of technology (except for networking). Instead, they give each teacher a technology budget. The teacher purchases the computers, software, network filtering, and peripherals for their classroom, hooking into the networking provided by the district.

    As a teacher develops as a professional, he or she evolves a classroom technology strategy, constantly adapting to new conditions in the room, among the students, in the standards, and in their world.

    Wild! Yes?

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *