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Comment by frevib

16 hours ago

Please not the schools. We don’t need privacy-invading closed systems with built-in slot machines. We need deterministic open systems where kids’ privacy is protected.

Please not schools…

30 comments

frevib

Reply
throwfish3000  16 hours ago

Chromebooks that run on Google services are already the default 1:1 device in schools. They're cheap, they take a beating and have good battery life.

  • munificent  13 hours ago

    I don't know what the "default" is, but as a data point of one: my kids' public school is all Windows laptops.

    • zythyx  8 hours ago

      The default is very very heavily weighted in Googles "Chromebook" favour. Getting a school with Windows (or Mac) exclusivity is a 4-leaf clover. Google genuinely have a pretty good product with Google Classroom though, so it's not completely lost. It's just a problem when schoolkids grow up and end up with new Windows/Mac laptops and have no idea how computers work outside of the web browser.

  • frevib  16 hours ago

    Same here. They’re subsidized by taking kids’ privacy.

    • bryanlarsen  11 hours ago

      That would be illegal in many jurisdictions. And schools in general take privacy very seriously. Most schools won't sign up for google edu without a solid privacy guarantee.

      Google is likely very happy to give up on the privacy violations for a few years of a child's life in exchange for getting that child hooked on Google services so they can freely violate privacy for an entire adult lifetime.

      1 reply →

  • dpoloncsak  15 hours ago

    I'd assume this opens up 'Googlebooks' to compete with the GPU/M Series Premium laptops so schools can provide them to teach things like Photoshop, Illustrator, CAD Design, anything that chromebooks couldn't do, right?

  • PaulHoule  16 hours ago

    The performance of the machine offered at schools seems to get just a little worse every year too... like one of these days they won't have to worry about kids playing Krunker in class because they won't be able to.

  • 7734128  16 hours ago

    It would be so much better for the student's IT proficiencies if the were some ordinary Linux computers instead. Preferably with limited central managment.

    The Chromebooks are probably cheaper than the hardware itself could be, but that's a good demonstration of the issue.

    • afavour  16 hours ago

      It wouldn’t. The central management of Chromebook is what makes the whole system usable. All you’d be doing is sentencing school IT folks to endless, endless support requests.

      2 replies →

    • jakeydus  14 hours ago

      Sorry, I love Linux, but could you imagine managing a fleet of the cheapest hardware possible and also teaching a bunch of 6th graders how to use Linux? School IT workers are already heroes. I don't like Google, but they're a necessary evil to keep those guys from tearing their hair out every day unless we dedicate significantly more resources to computing in schools.

      1 reply →

bko  16 hours ago

> We need deterministic open systems where kids’ privacy is protected

I don't think we need any computers really. They'll be inundated with computers and technology their whole lives. They'll figure it out. Just keep this tech out of the classroom altogether.

We've had computers in the classroom for over a decade now, scores and learning has not gone up. It's a failed experiment.

  • davedx  15 hours ago

    Why are you opposed to using personal computers for education?

    • daemin  5 hours ago

      There's also the point that the rich executives at these companies that make computers for school use send their own children to schools which do not use computers for education.

      If computers were that critical to education you'd think those same executives would be loading up their children with all the tech they can afford.

    • JumpCrisscross  15 hours ago

      > Why are you opposed to using personal computers for education?

      They'll have computers at home. And the evidence seems to point in one direction: the more exposure kids have to devices, the more stunted their development tends to be. Add to that the class division, where rich kids are increasingly raised with strictly-policed device exposure, while poor kids' classrooms are littered with iPads and Chrombooks, and I think we can start making blanket statements.

    • adastra22  6 hours ago

      Because objectively it does not improve outcomes. Sweden has recently reversed course based on student outcome data.

  • afavour  16 hours ago

    I don’t think we need math really. They’ll be inundated with math and arithmetic their whole lives. They’ll figure it out. Just keep math out of the classroom altogether.