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The Ghost In The Machine <ewill@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> espoused:
> In comp.os.linux.advocacy, Roy Schestowitz
><newsgroups@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> wrote
> on Wed, 20 Dec 2006 09:06:50 +0000
><2109314.UTY6JizDcz@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>:
>> __/ [ Mark Kent ] on Wednesday 20 December 2006 07:52 \__
>>
>>> begin oe_protect.scr
>>> Roy Schestowitz <newsgroups@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> espoused:
>>>> School District Dropping Macs for More "Appropriate Technology"
>>>>
>>>> ,----[ Quote ]
>>>>| Mr. Willard's Mac-free schools will also use open source software
>>>>| from Lenox Softworks. The combination of Windows plus open source
>>>>| software, he said, will prevent students from downloading music
>>>>| and movies to the computers.
>>>>|
>>>>| Some Macs will be allowed to stay in elementary and middle schools
>>>>| in concentrated areas, but it looks like high schools will have to
>>>>| do without.
>>>> `----
>>>>
>>>> http://www.macobserver.com/article/2006/12/18.4.shtml
>>>
>>> Using Windows will /prevent/ students from doing things... fascinating.
>>> Of course, it'll permit all manner of other people to use the machines,
>>> but the requirement is that they come in over the network.
>>
>> I've heard of hospitals becoming a botnets, but not schools. In any event,
>> the decision-maker seems clueless. For the majority of people who use Macs
>> or /wish/ to explore alternatives *gasp* there would at least be Mac
>> options. Isn't learning about choice and exploration? I guess they would
>> rather lock it all down. More like boot camp. Before you know it they'll
>> remove all the drinks (except for Coca Cola) from the vendign machines,
>> including water. Then they'll disable all the faucets.
>>
>
> Coca Cola will also be removed; the only drinks allowed
> will be fruit joice, in some locales. (It's an issue
> outside of COLA [!], but basically they're "empty
> calories", with fizz but no protein. Sucrose has been
> compared to a drug, and certainly it has in a milder form
> than, say, rock cocaine, the ability to accelerate one's
> thinking -- or have kids "bounce off the walls".)
There's been a big push here on getting healthy food into schools.
The "school meals" agenda is a major political one. They were originally
introduced because so many people were so poor that providing a good
school meal was one way of ensuring that the nation's kids got a decent
meal each day. Over the years, these migrated from unimaginative and
averagely cooked bland but nutritional meals into unimaginative and
predictable fat-flowing & vitamin free meals, eg., sausages, carrots
and mash in gravy turned into burger & chips with sugary ketchup.
Same for drinks, as you say above...
>
> As for the faucets, they may have to disable them because
> the pipes are a mess. :-) Welcome to USA, where the
> jails are overflowing and the schools are breaking down.
> But never mind that, where did you want to go today?
It's not all that different here. The government is once again looking
at a prison-ship. Life was so much easier when one could run penal
colonies :-)
>
> I'll admit to wondering whether Windows should be in
> the schools or not. Using Windows does make one more
> employable, but I do wonder if the idea of employment
> should be able to know where to point and click on Word,
> or whether one should actually be able to write a coherent
> sentence and figure out how to solve formulas such as
> x^2 - 7x + 4 = 0.
>
> Grammar checkers can only do so much. (Even freeware ones. :-) )
>
The generation currently going through school are probably the first for
whom writing is the second choice rather than the first for putting
information "down".
--
| Mark Kent -- mark at ellandroad dot demon dot co dot uk |
To be beautiful is enough! if a woman can do that well who should demand
more from her? You don't want a rose to sing.
-- Thackeray
|
|
