Least useful academic "innovation" of the year
Have you heard the one about the university that gave its incoming freshman $500,000 worth of free digital music players as an "academic" investment?
Duke University, in a move that seems more trendy than sensible, has given each incoming freshman an Apple iPod music player. Street value? About $300.
Apparently Duke is justifying this as an academic experiment, and not just a recruiting perk: (1) Students' iPods are engraved with their class (how cute). (2) The devices come preloaded with an address from the president, campus calendars and other information (and a folder with some brochures and a casette is insufficient how?). (3) And - the best line - students will be using these iPods in class somehow, presumably in language and music classes, and to download lecture recordings.
Or, as many upperclassmen (who aren't getting squat) point out, the freebies (which freshmen will be able to keep) will allow the sizable population who already owned an iPod to make a nice profit selling one of their players off and pocketing the cash.
The eggheads at Duke have this idea that outfitting all their new students with music players will somehow result in better academic performance, but will somehow not result in huge numbers of illegally-traded music files passing through the Duke network. Um, yeah. Right, guys.
Of all the ways a college could spend half a million dollars, is providing its freshman with expensive music toys really the best use of funds? Computers, I could see. Handhelds, sure. A music player in every backpack? Give me a break.
But hey, the parties on campus this year will sure be great with all these new DJs cueing up their favorite tunes off of their Duke-sponsored schwag.
Too bad there's no way to track how long those maps, welcome recordings and calendars last on the iPods before they're cleared out to make room for the latest Radiohead song. My ten bucks says they won't make it through orientation week.
Duke University, in a move that seems more trendy than sensible, has given each incoming freshman an Apple iPod music player. Street value? About $300.
Apparently Duke is justifying this as an academic experiment, and not just a recruiting perk: (1) Students' iPods are engraved with their class (how cute). (2) The devices come preloaded with an address from the president, campus calendars and other information (and a folder with some brochures and a casette is insufficient how?). (3) And - the best line - students will be using these iPods in class somehow, presumably in language and music classes, and to download lecture recordings.
Or, as many upperclassmen (who aren't getting squat) point out, the freebies (which freshmen will be able to keep) will allow the sizable population who already owned an iPod to make a nice profit selling one of their players off and pocketing the cash.
The eggheads at Duke have this idea that outfitting all their new students with music players will somehow result in better academic performance, but will somehow not result in huge numbers of illegally-traded music files passing through the Duke network. Um, yeah. Right, guys.
Of all the ways a college could spend half a million dollars, is providing its freshman with expensive music toys really the best use of funds? Computers, I could see. Handhelds, sure. A music player in every backpack? Give me a break.
But hey, the parties on campus this year will sure be great with all these new DJs cueing up their favorite tunes off of their Duke-sponsored schwag.
Too bad there's no way to track how long those maps, welcome recordings and calendars last on the iPods before they're cleared out to make room for the latest Radiohead song. My ten bucks says they won't make it through orientation week.
posted by Bob at
3:15 PM
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