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Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

Eye On Boise

High school student: ‘We tend to veer off and get distracted’

Whitney Webster, a high school student from Caldwell, testifies Tuesday against the Luna school reform plan. She said high school students tend to get distracted online; they should use laptop computers in class only under a teacher's guidance, she said. (Betsy Russell)
Whitney Webster, a high school student from Caldwell, testifies Tuesday against the Luna school reform plan. She said high school students tend to get distracted online; they should use laptop computers in class only under a teacher's guidance, she said. (Betsy Russell)

Whitney Webster, a student at Vallivue High School in Caldwell, said laptops for students and requirements for more online courses "will ultimately bring out far more negative outcomes than good." She said in the Miami, Fla. school district, students are being forced to take online classes and many are failing. "Taking an online course does not give a student more technological expertise," Webster told the Senate Education Committee.  "There needs to be reform in the educational system where technology plays a role, but a role that is balanced alongside the teacher." She said there currently are laptops for students in her English class, but they're used only to do research under the teacher's guidance. "As a high school student, we tend to veer off and get distracted with other things that are online," Webster said.



Betsy Z. Russell
Betsy Z. Russell joined The Spokesman-Review in 1991. She currently is a reporter in the Boise Bureau covering Idaho state government and politics, and other news from Idaho's state capital.

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