File this under the “Kids today have it made” category:
Schools and universities are often big fans of Apple products, which usually translates to labs and laptop carts full of Macs. Educational institutions across the country have also started to provide students with personal laptops. Louisiana recently launched a program to distribute MacBooks to elementary school students, and now Abilene Christian University in Texas is getting into the act as well. But rather than handing out MacBooks, the university will be distributing iPhones and iPod touches to all incoming freshmen.
Let’s hope the upperclassmen are honest folks, and don’t decide to “relieve” the freshmen of their shiny new gadgets. I have an iPod touch that is my new favorite toy. I’m not sure how much I would have concentrated on my coursework if I’d had it at 18, though.
“Abilene Christian University in Texas is getting into the act as well. But rather than handing out MacBooks, the university will be distributing iPhones and iPod touches to all incoming freshmen.”
That’s really, really sad, on two fronts: 1) If you want to get a college kid a useful piece of tech, it should be a voice recorder, not an iPod. 2) The iPhone is more hype than reality. I’ve used both an iPhone and Blackberry 8830, and the Blackberry is both the more elegant and useful device. While this might be a sign of crackberry addiction, I would pay the full $300 for the BB over getting a free iPhone.
Honestly, Quincy, anybody who thinks that a Blackberry is more elegant OR useful needs psychiatric help.
On a more serious note, though, I love my iPhone and think it’s one of the greatest pieces of technology ever developed. However, I can’t figure out why a university needs to give ANY such device to students. To me, it sounds like an IT department looking for a way to justify its importance. Or maybe a way for a school to sound cool when it recruits students. I just don’t see ANY way that it can help learning in ways that aren’t done just as easily without them.
Here’s what I don’t understand… an iPhone AND an iPod touch? Talk about your overlapping functionality. The iPod touch is pretty much an iPhone without the phone part. It takes a really brilliant IT type to give the kids two almost identical devices that do almost identical things.
And David, four words: Physical Keyboard and EvDO
If the money is already there for tech I do see the purpose of these gadgets. As a college student I know how much easier it would be to communicate if I was given a phone that had email capacity. Especially for students who go to internships or work I think these gadgets could become very useful tools.
Actually, they’re giving one OR the other. Not both. My assumption is that the kids who want to pay for the phone service get iPhone and the others get the iPod Touch. (Other than the phone function, they’re identical.)
You’re right that EVDO is a great advantage until an iPhone supports 3G, but it’s EDGE isn’t a showstopper for me. And the physical keyboard is just a waste of space when you’re doing things that don’t require it, so I see it as a disadvantage, not an advantage. I had some questions about how well a software keyboard would work, but after a few days, it was just as good to me. I could list a dozen things I’d like them to change about it, but it’s still head and shoulders above any other device I’ve tested. But that’s why different companies make different models.
Can we add this to tuition inflation?
So, did you fine folk watch the video they did?
http://www.acu.edu/technology/mobilelearning/index.html
I had my doubts, but watching this movie made me reevaluate my thoughts. Why not be proactive about using this kind of technology? The kids are going to have it anyway. I must say, that movie is a really visionary piece. And, in a day or two, once the SDK is out, I’m sure the iPhone will work as a voice recorder.
And Quincy, I strongly suspect that the apps they demo on the movie are web apps so they would also work on your Crackberry just fine…