Internet Safety News
Student Technology Support
by Anne Collier
My grandfather, a high-school physics teacher, had a car engine in his basement classroom, and one of the requirements for completion of his course was to take apart and reassemble the engine. We now have the 21st-century equivalent high-school students building computers from scratch.1 Hattiesburg, Mississippi, high-school teacher Lynne Houston learned the skill first, then started passing that knowledge along to her students, which was a turning point in her teaching career. "[My] students are excited about building computers," she said, "because they can see how their new skills apply in the real world. Their interest in building the machines carries over into other subjects. Once the Internet-ready computers hit the classroom, kids have access to numerous resources." They've built almost 6,000 computers for Mississippi schools so far.
In New York there's the MOUSE Squad, a group of student volunteers who offer technology support for New York City public schools. "Through a program run by MOUSE, a nonprofit group whose name is an acronym for Making Opportunities for Upgrading Schools and Education, the students learn the skills needed to troubleshoot technical problems in classrooms and computer labs."2
1Katie Dean. "Tech a Hit
in Mississippi Schools." Wired News. December
9, 2002, http://www.wired.com/news/school/0,1383,56599,00.html.
2Amy Cortese. "When Computers Won't Work,
Schools Call for Mouse." The New York Times. November
27, 2002, http://www.nytimes.com/2002/11/27/education/27MOUS.html.
Anne Collier is editor of the SafeKids/NetFamilyNewsletter and president of NetFamilyNews.org, a nonprofit news service for parents and teachers of online kids.
