Towards the end of the 2017-2018 school year, Lakeview High school Assistant Principal Michael Detoro announced that all students grades 9-12 would be receiving chrome books for the upcoming school year and losing some privileges with phones and personal devices.

It’s been a little bit over a month into the 2018-2019 school year now, and the “heads-up” about all students getting chrome books was definitely put into action on the first day of school. Mostly all students last year knew about this new addition to Lakeview, but I feel some of us had our doubts, and hoped we would still have wireless privileges on our personal devices…we soon found out we do not.

After hearing some of the comments from teachers and students, including myself, I decided to interview some of the staff and students to get their thoughts and feedback on these new computers as well as having limited phone privileges.

Junior Sydney Whipkey said, “I feel like we should still be able to have WiFi for our personal devices and that they should not have cut that out. When we first got the chrome books, I hated them but mind you I used past tense for that. Now, I don’t mind them. I feel as though it has become more useful to me and my school work although I wish we were able to have a different case, our own case, or even no case at all. Other than that, I don’t hate them anymore.”

Junior Megan Cross said, “Personally, I don’t like having to carry the chrome books around in a case or at all and I was not the least bit thrilled when I heard we were getting them but there was nothing I could do about it. Despite having to carry them around all day, I do find them useful as far as getting things done in class goes, and they make access to things easier such as notes and posted assignments from teachers.”

Talking to some students and hearing their opinion on these computers, I decided to reach out to some teachers to hear how their opinion differs or corresponds to some of the students.

Anatomy and Honors Chemistry teacher Maureen Bucko stated, “Personally, I’ve always like to do things the ‘old school way’ where you work out of a textbook. Now, with the chrome books, I’m not completely against them because it’s nice to not have to try and book a lab or struggle to get into one. I also like the fact that the students can work in class and have all the materials they need right in the room. I’m happy there is no WiFi for students because it helps them get things done in class, keeps students on task, and their focus/attention I’ve noticed, has been slightly better than in previous years.”

After hearing opinions from both students and staff, I talked to Detoro to got the better understanding of why the cancelling of WiFi took place.

Detoro said, “What we did this year was we got a new wireless carrier which therefore caused us to get a new wireless plan. If we had included WiFi for personal devices along with the chrome books, it would have been possible but the internet would be extremely slow due to how many people would be using both.”

Detoro then began explaining that by eliminating the usage of phones and personal devices, it would give those who do not bring phones to school or simply those who do not have one, a sense of everyone to feel equally a part of something. “With limiting the phone usage throughout the school day, it helps the students stay as occupied with the books and academics as much as possible.”

Loss of WiFi has been a very controversial topic at LHS since the start of the 2018-2019 school year, but as the days and weeks have gone on, the complaints and remarks about the connection being cut and the chrome books being put into place, have slimmed down and we’ve mostly gotten used to them.