Why Spanish Town High School should have Tablet in School Project with Homework Rooms

Looks like Minister of Finance, Audley Shaw should also be called Santa Clause for the Tablet in School Program.

During the Standing Finance Committee of Parliament on Tuesday May 3^rd 2016 he made mention of more tablets coming for more schools under the Government's Tablets in Schools Programme as reported in the article “More Tablets Coming For Schools”, published Friday May 6, 2016, The Jamaica Gleaner.

He was speaking on behalf of the Minister of Science, Technology, Energy and Mining, Dr. Andrew Wheatley. It was during this same meeting that he let drop the news that a new Telecom Provider was coming to Jamaica as detailed in my blog article entitled “Why New Telecom Provider coming to Jamaica may be using White Space Spectrum”. 

Well it looks like he also let drop details of a plan to give some eighty (80) tablets to some one hundred and fifty (150) schools as noted in the article “150 More Primary And Early Childhood Schools To Get Tablets”, published Thursday May 5, 2016, The Jamaica Gleaner. 

 Each school is actually getting two (2) sets of forty (40) tablets starting in September 2016. Take a listen to this audio clip of Minister of Finance, Audley Shaw speaking at the Standing Finance Committee of Parliament on Tuesday May 3^rd 2016.

It’s set to come to an end in June 2016, exactly as former minister of Science, Technology, Energy and Mining Phillip Paulwell had promised.

So how many Tablets are being given away this time around?

Audit of the TIS Pilot Project - Successful Deployment since December 2014

The Tablet in School Programme Pilot, which started in September 2015, has been going well thus far, with teachers colleges getting Tablets in a push towards a more interactive education system as noted in my blog article entitled “How Teachers' Colleges getting TIS Project Tablets heralds Projectors and Interactive Whiteboards for Engaging Teaching”. 

The distribution of the Tablets has been slow yet steady since the start of the 2014-2015 School Term as seen from the stats below:

1.      17,000 TIS Tablets distributed up until December 2014

2.      18,000 TIS Tablets distributed by the end of December 2014

3.      7000 Tablets distributed in early weeks of the Easter term in 2015

Four (4) contractors are responsible for the deployment of the Tablets:

1.      Innovative Corporate Solutions

2.      Digicel Jamaica

3.      Productive Business Solutions

4.      GeoTech Vision Enterprises Limited

The 25,000 Tablets as distributed in March 2015 by the four (4) contractors, reads as thus:

1.         10,500 Tablets from Innovative Corporate Solutions

2.         5,500 Tablets from Digicel Jamaica

3.         5,500 Tablets from Productive Business Solutions

4.         5,500 Tablets from GeoTech Vision Enterprises Limited

So what has happened since March 2015?

Audit of the TIS Pilot Project - Why High School will get no Tablet as Primary School are priority

Up until September 2015 according to the Audit of the TIS Project two thousand (2000) more tablet were distributed under the TIS Project bringing the total up to 27,000.

 

Back in December 2015, some seven hundred (700) tablets were distributed to Primary schools in East Kingston and Port Royal as noted in my blog article entitled “700 Tablets for East Kingston and Port Royal Primary Schools - Why Raspberry Pi Zero Great for Jamaican Secondary Schools”.

The following primary schools in East Kingston and Port Royal are earmarked for the seven hundred (700) more tablets as follows:

1.      225 for Windward Road Primary

2.      180 for Rollington Town Primary

3.      80 for Elletson Primary and Infant

4.      80 for Norman Gardens Primary

5.      80 for Junior High and Holy Rosary Primary

6.      27 for Port Royal Primary

That's because the High School student keep using the tablets to go to pornography websites and Facebook based on the preliminary review. So the focus has shifted away from High Schools to primary schools.

So what should be do about the High Schools?

Spanish Town High School needs Tablet in School Project - Tablet at School in a Homework and Testing Room

So now more tablet to more primary schools. But the High School, especially schools like Spanish Town High, still deserve to have Tablets, despite the pornography and hacking issue.

 

One option is to issue US$5 Raspberry Pi Zero computers to students, especially those High School student doing CXC and CAPE Computer Science programs. Hopefully, they'll teach the High Schoolers, particularly the girls, programming using the Raspberry Pi as noted in my MICO Wars Blog article entitled “Why the US$5 Raspberry Pi Zero is perfect Programmer’s Gift for New Year’s 2016”. 

Hopefully this time around they'll take their cues from Samsung Smart School E-Learning Platform and have a special room created to use the Tablets as noted in my Geezam blog article entitled “Samsung’s Smart School are Tablets for VARK Hexagons of Learning”.

Testing can also be done using the Tablets, with tests being written using Google Forms as described in my blog article entitled “How Google Forms creates Online Questionnaires and Surveys - Questionnaires and Surveys for your Blog”. 

Student should not be allowed to take the tablet home, as they can stay at school and do their homework in that special room. Then the Tablet can be returned to the cubby to be recharged for the next morning's class. TIS Project is a good idea; it just needs to be made more useful for Testing and Learning by having a designated Homework and Testing Room.

Spanish Town High School with specially designed Tablet in School Homework Rooms equipped with high speed Wi-Fi for CAP (Community Access Points) for the student and the wider community is the way forward.