Laptops, A Fixture at Gibraltar

The One Laptop Per Student program was expanded to include this year’s freshman class at Gibraltar High School. The computers, which were purchased using grant money from the federal Rural Education Achievement Program, are a fixture in classrooms. Photo by Len Villano.

As of this school year, every student at Gibraltar High School will be the proud owner of his or her very own laptop, thanks to an expansion of the One Laptop Per Student (OLPS) program.

Technology director Steve Minten says OLPS, which has provided each sophomore class at Gibraltar with laptops since 2010, grew to cover this year’s freshman class because the school’s elementary and middle school students are making greater use of the laptops in Gibraltar’s Computers On Wheels (COWs) stations.

“We used to have enough COWs for the freshmen and middle schoolers to share,” says Minten. “Instead of buying more, we decided to get the freshmen their own laptops.”

Laptops have now become a fixture at Gibraltar, and not just for students. Minten estimates that of the 650 computers that are in the building each day, about 630 of them are laptops.

“They’re all wireless, so we had to do stuff to build our network,” he says. “It has to be a really concentrated wireless atmosphere.”

Minten just installed a new series of access points which provide wireless coverage throughout most of the school. From his office in the school library, he can keep track of how far coverage extends from each access point as well as who and what is currently accessing the school’s network.

“These days any kid has at least a [smartphone] and a computer,” he says. “Every kid needs three IP (Internet Protocol) slots, where it used to be that one in three kids would need an IP spot.”

But just because a student has an internet-capable device, it doesn’t necessarily mean they’ll get to use it at the school.

“I can dump anything that’s not school-related off the network,” says Minten. “It’s not about them going on their phones when they shouldn’t, it’s because those devices aren’t protected by our firewall. I’ve got to keep the kids safe while they’re here.”

Minten says the school hasn’t had many problems with students using their laptops to access sites they shouldn’t or mess around in class.

Middle school teacher Andy Hallett says the laptops are great because they allow students to access original documents and video, rather than just whatever’s written in their textbooks.

“They’re digital natives,” says Hallett, whose students have been using the NASA website to study Project Gemini and Project Apollo, “so actually it’s easier to get them to crack open a computer than break open a textbook.”

Gibraltar technology director Steve Minten works on the school’s servers. As the system becomes outdated, the servers will be replaced with virtual servers from Amazon. Photo by Len Villano.

Students are also using their laptops to take notes in class, conduct Internet searches for information, and upload and receive online feedback for their assignments. Minten says it’s all an effort to make sure kids are ready for what they’ll be doing in college.

“I’ll talk to our seniors when they get to college, and they say they’re seeing kids who’ve never used a laptop before,” he says. “They’ll look over at this kid on their left, and he’s flopping around like a fish, absolutely clueless.”

In addition to learning how to use the computers in class, students are learning how to take care of them outside of it. Minten says students are becoming great troubleshooters, and he only sees about two students a week who have computer problems.

“It’s the staff I have more tickets for,” he says. “When [students] have a problem they just try something else.”

Minten says the unit price for this year’s 125 new laptops, which were purchased using grant money from the federal Rural Education Achievement Program, went down from last year’s by about $100.

He also says the wireless access points he installed this year cost far less than they would have a year ago, and the school is slowly switching over to a virtual server system which will make it so the school doesn’t have to spend tens of thousands of dollars physically upgrading its aging servers.

“As they get older and they can’t run, we’ll move everything over to Amazon,” he says. “The server’s in Virginia, but it plays along like it’s plugged into our switches. It’s far away, but it acts like it’s physically here.”

Minten says the virtual server service that Amazon.com offers is very adaptable and pretty cheap. It costs about 12 cents an hour to essentially rent server space from Amazon, and he can create a server as large or small as needed, upgrading without having to physically replace equipment.

“It’s easy to do. It asks you do you want a slow one, a medium one, or a fast one,” he says. “It’s pretty cool.”

The school’s HelpDesk server has already been moved over to Amazon, and Minten says the email server is slated to transfer from physical to virtual either over Christmas break or sometime next year.

“It’s a whole new structure, and it’s not going away,” says Minten. “I’ve been doing this gig for 25 years, and this is the future. I can see it.”