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iPhone/iPod Touch platform taking off on multiple college campuses?

Cleverboy

Cleverboy

macrumors 65816
Original poster
May 25, 2007
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Pocket Universe, nth Dimensional Complex Manifold
I remember reading the original mentions of Abilene Christian University and their well-executed "Connected" video, that visualized the possibilities for students.

Now, a recent New York Times article appears to be highlighting even MORE universities jumping onboard... with Apple keeping mum about how many others also might do the same.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/21/t...l=1&adxnnlx=1219605137-tdKkqsYJvmHLJTgVrOmKHw
  • University of Maryland
  • Oklahoma Christian University
  • Abilene Christian
  • Freed-Hardeman
At each college, the students who choose to get an iPhone must pay for mobile phone service. Those service contracts include unlimited data use. Both the iPhones and the iPod Touch devices can connect to the Internet through campus wireless networks. With the iPhone, those networks may provide faster connections and longer battery life than AT&T’s data network. Many cellphones allow users to surf the Web, but only some newer ones have Wi-Fi capability.
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Not that all Professors like the idea. The article noted the following:
The rush to distribute the devices worries some professors, who say that students are less likely to participate in class if they are multitasking. “I’m not someone who’s anti-technology, but I’m always worried that technology becomes an end in and of itself, and it replaces teaching or it replaces analysis,” said Ellen G. Millender, associate professor of classics at Reed College in Portland, Ore. (She added that she hoped to buy an iPhone for herself once prices fall.)

Robert S. Summers, who has taught at Cornell Law School for about 40 years, announced this week — in a detailed, footnoted memorandum — that he would ban laptop computers from his class on contract law.

“I would ban that too if I knew the students were using it in class,” Professor Summers said of the iPhone, after the device and its capabilities were explained to him. “What we want to encourage in these students is active intellectual experience, in which they develop the wide range of complex reasoning abilities required of the good lawyers.”
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This seemed to be of concern to the Abilene "Connected" video makers as well, as they suggested some solutions for having devices automatically "restrict" themselves (opt-in) when class has begun. It's still exciting though. Boy, makes me almost want to go back and enhance my education.

~ CB
 
I'm from Abilene so I know a LOT of people at ACU and I haven't heard much about this. The only thing I heard about the iPhone/ACU is that all the students were supposed to get iPhones (paid with by their tuition) but then ACU changed their minds and said 'no'.
 
That is great. Lucky Kids didn't even have to wait in line on the 11th. Wonder how the plans work.
 
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