School-enhanced technology: The good and bad

Arrowhead High School has a new requirement for all students: bring a laptop to school every day. Students are required to purchase a laptop which gives students to access to Google Drive, Google Classroom, and other classroom activities.

Rachel Thorn, a senior at Arrowhead High School, just bought a laptop for the school year. Thorn says the laptop has worked well for her and that she can also use the laptop for college next year.

“My MacBook was a lot of money but I will be able to use it for college so I spent the extra money on a really good laptop for that reason,” says Thorn.

Thorn says she doesn’t agree with the school making students buy laptops, but she says it was time for her to buy a laptop anyway so the timing worked out.

Students are required to bring the devices every single day. iPads and other tablets aren’t recommended for students to bring because they don’t work well with Google and don’t have a keyboard.

Morgan Merbeth, a senior at Arrowhead High School, says she isn’t a fan of the school requiring laptops for students.

Merbeth says she has had trouble connecting to the school wi-fi with her laptop and that she misses using the computer lab for classes instead of having to carry around her own device throughout the day.

“Having to carry around my laptop everyday is such a hassle. I don’t use my laptop as much as I thought I would so I find it pretty pointless to carry around all day every day,” says Merbeth.

Merbeth says she feels pencil and paper is a better method for students to be doing homework with because it doesn’t involve as many problems as having a laptop.

Incase students’ devices don’t work or students forget their device, the library allows students to rent out the laptop for the day. If the laptop isn’t returned by the end of the day, they owe a fee of $5.00.

Thorn says the school should allow students to use tablets and iPads as a device instead of a laptop.

“An iPad would be able to do everything that a laptop does here at school for things that we would actually be doing. I could access the Google Drive and Google Classroom from my iPad or tablet,” says Thorn.

Merbeth says she uses her sister’s iPad at school sometimes and that it works well with finishing her homework at school.

“I’ve been able to do everything and access just the same things on my iPad as I do on my laptop, my iPad is better than my laptop; if not, it’s faster,” says Merbeth.