From Notebook to Chromebook

For centuries schools have used paper and pencil to provide education to their students.

Over this past year, New Ulm High School has provided every student and staff member with a Chromebook in the hope of a better education. This has been a new trend for high schools throughout the nation. “I see the Chromebook as an educational tool,” NUHS Principal Bergmann said.

“We have been waiting as other districts around us have done it, and finally, the funding was there,” Media Specialist Ms. Hoek said. Some of the schools in the area that are currently one-to-one are St. Peter, Maple River, and Mankato.

One-to-one means that each student in the district receives a device that they can bring home and use. These machines are being treated like textbooks. When receiving a device in September, the student is expected to return it in quality condition at the end of the year. Students do have the option to take out a thirty dollar insurance policy to limit the expense if something were to happen to the devices.

The funding is always a big part of public schools being able to provide the students with the equipment to be successful in school. “The Chromebooks are under a lease program, so part of it being a lease we can flip and keep getting new versions,” Hoek said.

But the actual price of “the Chromebooks are about four hundred and nine dollars; if you took the price of your six textbooks in all of your classes it is way more then four hundred and nine dollars,” Bergmann said.

“Altogether the Chromebooks cost us 700,000 dollars, 5th through 12th grade,” Bergmann said.  Bergmann and Hoek both believe the Chromebooks bring great value to our school.

What does providing everyone with a new Chromebook bring to our school? “Teachers now can plan lab type work on the devices knowing that every day the students will have them,” Bergmann said.

“Students now have the ability to access the lessons at any time submit work at any time,” Hoek said.