Economic Impacts on Education

At no point in American history have sufficient resources been allocated to education. It doesn't take a visionary to know this will still be the case in the year 2000. Putting a price tag on Tablet is pure speculation, but $2,000 could be in the ballpark. We must find a way to get Tablet into the hands of the student. Who is going to pay for these computers and the software to run on them?

Some universities currently require their students to purchase a computer in addition to the costs of books, tuition, and other items. The limited resources of students are strained enough that this additional cost is not often appreciated. Despite assurances that the naive freshman is buying a ``productivity tool for life,'' by senior year it will be obsolete and suitable for use only as a planter. Something, either economic or technological, must happen to get us out of this rut.

What will happen is that in the university of the year 2000, students will be given a computer on their first day. Over the years that they spend at the university, a fixed cost will be assessed each term. This cost will pay for the computer, tuition, access to a myriad of database services, and online textbooks. By the time students leave the university, Tablet will be theirs to keep. The reason this scenario is different from today is that by 2000, the technology will have reached saturation; the way typewriter technology had reached saturation by World War II. Tablet is a complete tool which will integrate into people's lives and maintain its value. Manual typewriters maintained their value after electrical typewriters came around, finally meeting their match with the word processor. It will take another product generation, several years down the road, to do in Tablet. We have difficulty imagining what Tablet's successor will be able to do---but given time we will think of something.

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