Cellphones: The New Bookbag?

Cellphones are thought of a classroom distraction to many schools. But not to Abilene Christian University in Texas. Two-thirds of their 950 incoming freshmen will receive an Apple iPhone 3-G to enhance their classroom experience. According to technewsworld.com, students will be expected to use the phone to complete activities such as brainstorming ideas, getting virtual handouts, and listening to podcasts in class, and teachers will be able to check attendance.

"The time is approaching when these [smartphones] will be as much 

a part of education as a bookbag," says the authors of a report last year by the nonprofit New Media Consortium (a company that studies new technologies that might have an impact on teaching.)

Though I can see where a smartphone such as the iPhone would be a useful tool for teaching, I'm not sure smartphones should be used in the classroom outside of school. For example, one of the points in the article was how by using smartphones, teachers and students would be able to stay in contact 24/7 and be able to do things such as teachers sending out emails and students taking quizzes on the go. As a student, I would not want to be connected with school all day and all night long; when my classes are over for the day, all I want to worry about is if I should watch Grey's Anatomy or The Office later that night.

However, though I don't think smartphones should be used for activities outside of class, I do think using them during class would be a good idea. Apple currently offers over 80 applications for its iPhones that involve education. These applications range from learning to tell time to learning Italian. I think using an gadget such as the iPhone would make students more excited about learning since they get to use a device that not a lot of people have and that has so much neat technology. Ultimately I think students would benefit from using iPhones in the classroom because the iPhones would teach lessons in a creative way and students would gain experience with operating new technologies.

Cell Phones and Medical Imaging

Cell phones are great for many things: I can keep in touch with my friends, send text messages, listen to music, and surf the web. But who ever thought that cellphones would be able to do more than keep people connected at the fingertips?

In May 2008, ScienceDaily.com reported that engineers at the University of California, Berkeley, developed a way to use cell phones to make medical imaging available to people all over the world. Medical imaging technology includes items such as ultrasounds and X-rays that can do everything from detecting tumors to monitoring fetuses. According to Boris Rubinsky, a UC Berkeley professor that helped developed this new application for cell phones, "Diagnosis and treatment of an estimated 20 percent of diseases would benefit from medical imaging, yet this advancement has been out of reach for millions of people in the world because the equipment is too costly to maintain."

Professor Rubinsky's system uses the cell phone to transmit raw data to a central server where the information is created into an image that is then sent back to the cell phone. This process simplifies the equipment needed to use medical imaging which lowers the cost of medical imaging. This cell phone system would be beneficial to doctors in poorer countries because they could have the tools they need to properly diagnose and treat their patients. Acquiring a cell phone capable of using this technology would be easy because the technology works with any cellphone that can send and receive graphics, video, and audio clips. 

One of my concerns with this cell phone medical imaging is how easy obtaining a cell phone in developing nations would be. However, a member of Professor Rubinsky's team reassures that even in remote villages, cellphones are found because little infrastructure is needed to maintain wireless networks. Dropped calls wouldn't be a big issue either because sending the imaging data is a lot easier than sending voice signals.  

As improvements in cell phone technologies are made, I'm glad that these new technologies allow people to do awesome things like surf the web and use GPS on their phones. I'm proud that these new technologies are headed toward making world-changing advancements such as medical imaging with cell phones possible.

Green Computers

I love how society as a whole is going green. Everywhere I turn, I see signs of our growing environmental awareness. Recycling bins are becoming almost as plentiful as trash cans, and shirts and tote bags that endorse going green are a new fashion statement.

And now, to make things even better, computers are going green too.

Most used PCs in the United States are dumped in landfills or given to third world countries because recycling computer parts is too slow and expensive. Well, here comes the US Environmental Protection Agency to the rescue! The EPA is providing funds to help the organization EPCglobal work with manufacturers to put radio frequency identification tags on all their components. These tags allow recycling plants to use scanners that immediately read each part's make, model, and history as the parts came to the plant. These scanners make the recycling of computer parts become a much more efficient process, which helps minimize electronic waste. 

Kudos to this effort to combine technology and environmental awareness to help the world go green, one computer at a time!