It Does Not Compute

In China, where 10^th graders do double the homework of American kids (averaging four hours a day), literacy level is around 90% – now ranking four points higher than in the U.S. – Duitch Consulting Bulletin – December 2009

Hard facts: American children will face increasing education and skill-based competition from workers from other nations who are paid vastly less per hour for the same services. Perhaps the dollar will collapse, and the Chinese will no longer tie their currency to ours anymore, to make up for the difference. But then, what would life be like in a country where all the staples and commodities are priced in the international market without reference to the buying-power of the dollar… when we really can’t buy much anymore? Is that really the standard of living we should be preparing our children for?

One of the great defining characteristics of Americans is our willingness to compete. Combine that with a free and open society where bucking the rules and swimming against the current has provided the unique acceleration of invention and creativity to contribute a wealth of new ideas, products, services and all sorts of wondrous contraptions that the world now takes for granted. But in 2010, the world is increasingly being given to those with the ability to deal with sophisticated technologies and economic structures built upon that complexity of American invention. The starting point for much of what we invent requires much more knowledge than ever before.

For faithful readers of this blog, you know my passion for upgrading and expanding the American educational system, from pre-K through the most demanding post-graduate study. I believe in ubiquitous access to any level of education any child in this great nation aspires to and is capable of digesting, and the cost barriers to such children in getting that education are miniscule, in my opinion, to the social costs in not leveling our playing field and finding our best and brightest to challenge the minds in the rest of the world. Indeed, the social costs of an expensive justice system and welfare support required for our long-term failures would be a multiple of the costs of fixing our educational system in the first place… giving kids a chance to earn their way out of potential trouble.

I’ve addressed the schools before, and this evening, I’d like to look at one feature of our primary and secondary educational system that everyone reading this blog probably takes for granted – access to a computer. Pull mobile phones and computers out of your life, and while the peace and quiet might feel good for a while, sooner or later, you can feel the isolation set in and know that those who are competing with you are grateful for your surrender.

According to the U.S. Census, about two-thirds of American households have home computers with Internet access. Great, but that also means that one-third of such households do not, and while many elderly may be counted in that group (one of the fastest growing sectors of computer-users, by the way), the unfortunate reality is that the bulk of such “deprived” households don’t have a computer with Internet access because they cannot afford it and/or because it is not a part of their cultural experience. To make matters worse are those scores of teachers in classrooms where there are sufficient computers but who rebel against “modernity” and rely on old-world, paper-based lesson plans – because that’s how they were trained to teach!

But the “digital divide” is troubling nonetheless. For those students with a driving need to access computers, but whose families just do not have the money, there is always the public library. The December 7^th Washington Post providedes an example: “Most afternoons, it is crowded with students from low-income or immigrant families using the computers. Although [some of these students may] live in one of the richest counties in the United States, these students recount skipping lunch to work at school labs or making long journeys to the public library after school… Such effort is necessary because students are doing much of their work online: reading textbooks, watching podcasts, using discussion boards and creating PowerPoint presentations.”

The Post also provides anecdote that says it all: “Librarians at Woodrow Wilson provided an excuse note for 15-year-old Juan Henriquez after he lost an eight-page paper on the Bill of Rights because his computer session timed out before he'd saved his work... ‘I felt mad,’ Juan said. ‘I didn't know what I was going to do.’… Juan, the son of Salvadoran immigrants, said he prefers working at the library because if he stays after class to work in the school lab he gets too hungry.” It’s not just having a computer in the school… it’s having access when and where a student really uses it.

If our government (national, state and local) cannot provide computers to students to take home, is this a job for corporate America – to adopt schools and students, mentoring them, providing hands-on role models and providing computers for the deserving? When Wall Street racks up record profits and pays out huge bonuses, I simply wonder if their just might be a better use for a big chunk of that money.

I’m Peter Dekom, and I just wonder why those in power seem constantly to miss the obvious.