Tulsa Students Getting High Tech Education

Sunday, April 1st 2007, 4:40 pm

By: News On 6

Some north Tulsa grade schoolers have a high-tech education tool at home Sunday. Dozens of families drove off with computers this weekend, free of charge. The News On 6â€™s Joshua Brakhage reports the third and fourth-grade students at Springdale Elementary have access to computers Sunday, not just at school or the library, but in their own homes.

"I think this is going to be an awesome thing for our third and fourth grade, " said Springdale Principal Larry Smith.

Smith is just as excited about the computers as his students are.

"I'm very excited that they're excited about it, which tells me they're going to do a lot of great things at home with it," said Smith.

The PC's were assigned to more than 120 grade schoolers. Every third and fourth-grader will go home with the entire package, a CPU, monitor, keyboard and mouse. Every machine is already Internet-ready and loaded with software.

"This grade level is kind of neat because it's a game to them, so they're playing a game and don't realize they're learning," said Glenn DeWeese of PC Power.

The computers come courtesy of DeWeese and volunteers with PC Power.

"We've been wanting to do Springdale for some time, and we finally got time and decided to do it," said DeWeese.

Now dozens of families are headed home, with a new monitor and CPU sitting shotgun.

PC Power says the "thank you" they're hunting for is on students' smiling faces, a gift even the givers have no problem sharing.

For years, PC Power has partnered with Cleveland Middle School, but thought it was time to get the younger generation wired. PC Power is also working to provide free, high-speed Internet access to those students' homes.