Good for HVRHS students

What a difference a couple of years makes. Remember back when then-Principal Matt Harnett met with resistance to his proposal during the 2012-2013 school year at Housatonic Valley Regional High School to provide all its students with iPads, or later, iPad Minis? It was a tough time in general for the Region One School District, with its budget under fire and nixed by negative votes six times before finally passing the seventh time, after the district was already into the 2013-2014 school year. It was a time of uncivil discourse, lawsuits and finger pointing, making for uncomfortable referendum meetings, votes and special hearings, as well as, likely, some very uncomfortable barbecues and summer parties that year where the subject of the Region One referendum, whatever its then-current incarnation, arose.

So it was not a good time for Harnett to find support for an expensive (almost $100,000) proposal, even after having analyzed the need and reviewed the plans for the purchase in open meeting for more than a year. There was too much ill will from taxpayers going against it. That’s not to say, however, that the time wasn’t right for such an initiative. Can anyone actually argue any more that students should not be given every technological advantage possible? Whatever they may plan to do once they graduate from high school, a good working knowledge of online communication and easy use of multiple devices used for that communication will be critical for their future success. 

It is therefore good news that HVRHS’s Principal Jose Martinez and Assistant Principal Ian Strever, as well as the current faculty and board of directors, have found a way to implement the issuing of ThinkPad 11e Chromebooks to all high school students in time for the beginning of this school year on Aug. 31. The faculty received iPads a couple of years ago, so will be comfortable using the technology as part of their curriculum implementation. Now it will be the students’ turn.

Some parents and other adults, as well as the students themselves, may have some trepidation with the possibility of students overcoming firewalls and using the Internet inappropriately rather than for research and schoolwork. There is also the fear that students could use the communication for bullying or sexting. But these students will generally already have dealt with the freedom from adult supervision that can be found in online discussions. Now is the time for them to learn how to cope with that and learn from missteps, as well as listening to and acting on advice from those who care about them. 

High school students experience the challenges of maturing face-to-face with their peers, parents and teachers, as well as those of less personal but no less powerful online maturing. Students will need to be very aware of the vast opportunities as well as the latent dangers in posting their thoughts online while they are navigating their high-school careers, no matter how they do that. They’ll need to remember that when they post online, it will affect their reputations in a very real way, and in a way that could follow them for an unexpectedly long time.

Good luck to all at HVRHS with this entry into a cohesive approach to technology and education. It’s a step whose time has certainly come.