…it's ridiculous when you consider that kids in the Los Angeles inner city schools frequently don't even have one text per child.

I’ve attended one of LA inner city schools. I was horrified at the general condition, the lack of motivation (on the students’ part as well as some really bad teachers), etc.

Thankfully I was able to transfer to another school w/in a month.

I do not envy CA right now.

And while he didn’t say it there, here’s an Ars Technica article from last month about CA going open source for the high school math and science books.
“Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger has an ambitious plan to reduce the cost of education in California. He intends for the state to develop digital open source textbooks for high school math and science classes. The books will be available for free and will be used at public schools across the state.”

The bad part is how CA plans to pay for the devices, which are not going to be cheap, and track them, since students should be able to take their textbooks home to study, etc. CA is virtually bankrupt, and unlike our federal government, it cannot print money

Schwarzenegger is threatening to shut down the State government in July *whatever that means* since we’re basically bankrupt. We have zero dollars in this state for anything, let alone ereaders for all the millions of kids in school. Aside from that, all I see in blogland is that the price of ebooks is comparable to the price of paper books. Are we to believe that text publishers are going to be nice and sacrifice profits so that California can buy etexts at a discount? I don’t think so.

Anyway, I don’t see how the State can mandate something like this. In my kid’s middle school each child is given two textbooks, one to keep at school and the second to keep at home, just so they don’t have to hurt their backs schlepping them back and forth. While I appreciate my kids not being burdened by the extra weight, it’s ridiculous when you consider that kids in the Los Angeles inner city schools frequently don’t even have one text per child. Go figure.

How many are accounted for each student in the budget? Will parents be responsible for paying for a new e-reader if their child breaks it? What if they want to opt out of their child having one, because they can’t afford it when it breaks or gets crushed or gets soda on it? Will they be allowed to have the traditional books instead? Will they have to buy them?

This isn’t a step that can be taken lightly or because it’s a quick fix to a HUGE state problem. I agree in decades to come, this will be how kids are raised, with ereaders in their pockets instead of a heavy backpack full of texts. But it’s not there yet.

A friend I work with told me she was offered the choice to purchase a print or digital book for a college class she had coming up. The e-version was 40% less than the print version. I assume that’s because she was only “renting” it – it expired after 6 months and because she couldn’t resell it or loan it within the the 6 months she had access to it.

I can’t imagine how that would work for a public school system that is likely to re-use its books for years before they switch editions.

On the other hand, I’m surprised at the number of people who say they couldn’t learn without being able to highlight or notate. I made notes – if necessary – on a separate notepad. And write in my books?! Blasphemy!

California is one of the states whose purchase of textbooks is courted hot and heavy by publishers so this will be interesting to watch.

As for kids being careless with their electronics— don’t forget that many children now have been raised on technology– computers at home, cell phones at an early age, and all sorts of things like MP3 players. I remember giving my nephew his first computer at age 3 and a leap pad 8 years ago. His parents gave him a cell phone a few years back and a laptop last year. I don’t think he has managed to break anything– which is more than I could say about my brother at that age.

For my daughter (who will be homeschooled next year, but up until now, was in public school), we made copies of the pages she was studying so she could highlight and annotate. Then once she’d taken the test, we recycled those pages. I wouldn’t know how to study without being able to underline, highlight or annotate. I wouldn’t know how to teach someone to study without that. So while I totally think that ebooks should be the way of the future in that it will make textbooks more updateable and therefore, relevant, I don’t think the devices are quite there yet.

I’m doing a fairly basic report today and I have 5 different documents open in 3 different programs, but I’m not referencing any CFR, MIL or other standards or hunting down specific technical information. Sorry, I still find I need paper for certain kinds of work.

The good part of this plan is that by next August, there might be new digital readers including a tablet style netbook with a transreflective screen that mimics eink but also has the functionality of a computer. The bad part of this plan is that we just don't know what the future holds for digital devices.

I’d like to know how my bankrupt state is planning on paying for the readers? Are we getting a grant from Bill Gates? Additionally, I would be surprised if the publishers granted open use of purchased books (why would they?). We’d have to pay a fee per pupil, per year, and that would add up quickly and likely outstrip the cost of printed books in a few short years.

I really like this idea, but I worry that it’ll be a logistical nightmare for the people actually doing the work, and could end up becoming even more expensive than the paper books.