According to the Wise County Messenger, (“Students May Get Recycled Computers,” by Brian Knox, 13 May 2007) the Northwest Independent School District northwest of Fort Worth, Texas may give five-year-old computers scheduled for replacement to students without computers at home.
The hard drives will be wiped and a version of Linux will be installed on them. Given their age, I hope it will be light-on-resources Xubuntu or child-centered Edubuntu versions of Ubuntu Linux. (If you’re a regular reader, this will be no surprise.) But I would love to know their Linux distribution choice and logic.
Environmentally, reusing old machines is better than scrapping them. Educationally, giving students a resource they wouldn’t otherwise have it a bonus.
School Superintendent Karen Rue sums up the logic of the action
“These computers may not have market value, but they have kid value.â€