No Computers in an Area Full of Them

The Waldorf school is located in Los Altos, California. It is part of Silicon Valley, which is home to many technology giants such as Google, Apple, Yahoo, and even Hewlett-Packard. Many of these employees send their kids to the Waldorf school, which is $17,750 for grades K-8 and $24,400 for high school (grades 9-12). Except, this school has decided to not allow technology at ALL. The school allows no computers or any other devices and aren't even happy about home usage. Many of the "big-wig" parents and others who have become aware of the situation offer different opinions about the necessity of engaging students as well as the idea that technology can come easy. The school claims "those who endorse this approach say computers inhibit creative thinking, movement, human interaction, and attention spans". However, I disagree because along with the internet comes a wide range of sites and services and one must be critical about knowing what to do and how to promote themselves on the web. They must also learn how to interact over the web because these days networking is crucial. One parent, Alan Eagle has a daughter and son attending Waldorf and is also working in executive communications at Google. He"fundamentally rejects the notion you need technology to aid in grammar and that the idea an app on an ipad can better my kids to read or do arithmetic, that's ridiculous". I have to agree with Eagle to some extent because these Applications will never drastically help out a student, but they could improve them and also make them more comfortable researching and studying on the web because his son is already in 8th grade and he doesn't even know how to use google. In addition two other quotes stood out. Ann FLynn who works for the National School Boards Association say that "if school have access to the toold and can afford them, but are not using the tools, they are cheating our children". She is very right. A school like the Waldorf School has plenty of money from their huge tuitions to supply electronic devices, but instead they stick to pens and pencils and limit the resources for their students. Another parents who supports the school decisions says that "Teaching is a human experience...Technology is a distraction when we need literacy, numeracy, and critical thinking. The school has hired teachers who base learning on hands-on activties they using such as cutting up food for fractions to learn and so far is has worked out because students have gone on to big name colleges.