The Pros and Cons of Chromebooks in Sparta by Sylvia Kloian

A couple of weeks ago, several students caught wind of some news: next year, there is a large possibility that Sparta will be buying chromebooks for every student in 6th to 12th grade. There are varying opinions that I have heard about this. Personally, I don't like the idea, but there are several positives to it. For instance, every student would have a laptop to work on, and as more and more classrooms go paperless, a lot of pupils are assigned work online. This would be useful if someone wants to work on homework or other assignments during lunch. Instead of having to go to the library, they can simply take their chromebook out.
However, there are a lot of risks to (temporarily) owning a chromebook. If anything happens to it, students will have to pay for the damages, which is money that many parents and kids are not going to want to spend, especially if the laptop was not something they even wanted in the first place. And although it seems like it's a good idea to give children computers, and the board may think that that will solve the problem for students without computers at home, some kids might not have internet access, and with so many assignments being on google sites, the pupil still can't do any work. I had a conversation with my Chemistry teacher about this topic, and she said that the administration wants to give her a new laptop, too, but she is completely content with the technology she has now, and does not wish to change it.
This brings me to the next con. I know several students who already have laptops, and they think that if they were supplied with another one, it would be a waste. After all, many classrooms currently have enough chromebooks for 30 students, which has proved to be sufficient. I take notes on paper in most of my classes, and the classes I do do computer work in already have chromebooks. One of the biggest concerns of the adults of Sparta, though, is that they will be made to pay taxes for a very expensive decision that they might not even think is necessary. So, it seems now that the cons outweigh the pros, but it's very probable that you students reading this now will be able to read it again next year on your very own chromebook.