‘I suppose the other kids are jealous,” concedes Joshua Harris, 12, sitting, like every other member of his English class, in front of his very own laptop computer.
The “other kids” are all the children who did not manage to get into St Cecilia’s, a new Church of England secondary school that opened its doors in Wandsworth, south London, last year and this year had eight children scrambling for each of its 150 places.
Joshua clearly feels lucky compared with all those other children. He says his mother is not even a church-goer. “I’m here because I live on the estate up the hill,” he says. “But I’m the only person from my primary school who got in here.”
There are plenty of reasons for St Cecilia’s to be popular. Sheer newness and glossy, high-tech appearance for a start. Even the head teacher, Jeffrey Risbridger, admits that from the outside St Cecilia’s, with its large plasma screen flashing up the names of guests in the foyer, looks more like a plush new office block than a high school. But it is the school’s laptop policy that may be its biggest lure for parents and pupils.
St Cecilia’s, building its way to a full complement of 900 pupils, currently has just 11, 12 and 13-year-olds on roll. But every one of its 300 pupils has their own laptop, picked up in the morning and used across subjects until the school day ends at 2.30pm. If they then want to stay on to complete homework the building is open — and the laptops are available — until 6pm.
The laptops are a vital part of a state-of-the-art information and communication technology (ICT) scheme in which the latest radio technology and extended battery power are used to avoid the need for cables. Every classroom is equipped with electronic whiteboards, upon which teachers flash up their lessons, consigning the old-fashioned handout to history.
Pupils can do their homework onscreen at school and file it electronically for marking. They can also access and work on their school files from home computers. It all means less paper and fewer books, and much more gathering of knowledge via the internet.
Risbridger is proud to have steered St Cecilia’s down a steep technological path. “What’s the point in having a new 21st century school and running it along 19th century lines?” he asks.
He would ideally like his pupils to take their machines home at night in the padded rucksacks provided but “in inner-city London where 11-year-olds get mugged for a £10 phone never mind an £800 computer the risks are too high”.
The pupils would certainly like to take the laptops home. If they could get away with it, the 11-year-olds would probably take them to bed with them. Joshua, 12, may be a blasé year 8 pupil now but last year was a different story. “I used to come into school early just to get my laptop,” he confides, adding that although the novelty has worn off, he still loves his computer.
“It just gives a neat presentation of work,” he says, tapping away in his English class, electronically marking up the repetition, rhyme and rhythm in a Caribbean poem.
The laptops are not confined to the classrooms. In the school canteen, pupils even tap away over a sandwich. One boy, learning guitar, is accessing a site devoted to flamenco dancing. That ought to be as sexy as it ever gets. The school uses a special internet service provider to block access to unsuitable sites.
But despite the popularity of its laptop policy, the school’s chosen route raises key questions about technology and learning and is not without risks.
Does the technology result in better education, improve attainment and offer good value for money, given the tightness of school funds? As his roll rises, will Risbridger be able to provide a laptop for every child? Can a school, even one as new as St Cecilia’s, keep up with the speed of technological advance? In The Flickering Mind: The False Promise of Technology in the Classroom, American writer Todd Oppenheimer argues that countless US schools have been conned into buying expensive computer systems they do not need and do not know how to use and which add nothing to children’s education. Schools, he insists, have squandered money that would have been better spent on teachers and books.
Risbridger says he wrestled with such issues from the moment he was appointed head of St Cecilia’s. With the money involved, the wonder is that he sleeps at night. The school’s computer system is costing £150,000 a year in new machines. Maintenance of the system, outsourced to a private company, adds another £55,000 a year. How much it will cost to update the laptops with an estimated shelf life of three years, he admits, is as yet “the great unknown”.
Risbridger points out that most schools could not afford St Cecilia’s level of investment in technology. Most head teachers in Britain never have the luxury of St Cecilia’s clean slate and a set-up fund of £1.2m. “In my last headship, I always felt like a rabbit caught in headlights when it came to ICT,” he says. “There was so much conflicting advice. Some would say invest in PCs and then you would be advised laptops were best . . . then suddenly palm pilots were the way forward.”
At St Cecilia’s, he feels, for the first time, that he is ahead of the game, though he knows his pioneering path is a risky one. “But with innovation sometimes you just have to stick your neck out,” he argues. “I can’t answer whether it is value for money until we see the consequences a few years down the line.”
When it comes to a link between exam performance and technology, Risbridger has looked at all the conflicting research. For him, the jury is still out on the issue. But grades are not his prime motivation. His aim is to equip children for an adult world in which most will use computers daily. It is about making the laptop just another familiar tool alongside the books and paper the school still uses.
“It’s about balance,” he says. Some schools get the balance wrong and end up with technology for technology’s sake. Risbridger thinks St Cecilia’s has got it right.
Time will tell if the head who stuck his neck out is right or the money would indeed have been better spent on teachers and books.
