Logging on for a new school year in Mississippi

The changing face of the American classroom

Students put software on some of the school's 120 Dell laptops. Teachers can check out the laptops for use in their classrooms. The Excel Technology class is in charge of maintaining the computers.

TUPELO, Mississippi (CNN) -- An eighth-grader makes his way to the principal's office clutching a note in his hand -- a familiar sight in schools across America.

But at Tupelo Middle School in Tupelo, Mississippi, that student is as likely to be holding a work order and be on his way to troubleshoot the principal's computer as he is to be lectured about being tardy or talking during class.

The more than 50 students in the Excel Technology class are an in-house technical support staff for the school's computer systems.

If a teacher needs a computer set up for a class, a technology problem solved, or new software installed, he'll send for an in-house 13-year-old expert instead of an outside contractor.

The teacher fills out a work order and the Excel Technology class does the rest.

And it's a lot to do. The school has 1,150 seventh- and eighth-grade students from this small southern city, but they have a computer network that links every classroom, six computer labs, and eight rolling carts loaded with 15 laptops that can be moved from class to class.

Excel students have Internet access, Microsoft programs, digital cameras, scanners, Adobe Photoshop, Web site software such as FrontPage, digital video cameras, Avio video editing machines, CD burners, and Proxima projectors.

Each classroom is set up for wireless laptops, which teachers book as required. The eighth grade techies do all the maintenance.

When they aren't troubleshooting, they're updating the school Web site -- which they created -- typing documents, scanning photos, taking and downloading digital photos, burning CDs, and using programs such as Publisher, Word, and PowerPoint to create teachers' classroom materials.

Students also fill the positions of "tech helpers" for teachers wanting tutors on hand in case their students, using computers in class, have questions and need assistance.

"It's been wonderful. We are never down," says Principal Linda Clifton, who adds the program "saves a tremendous amount of money."

Plugging in and logging on for a new school year

Tupelo Middle School received a grant from the Appalachian Regional Commission that enabled it to purchase laptop computers for the residents at Traceway Retirement Community. Students spent the 2001-2002 school year teaching the residents to use them.

The Excel Tech program is just the tip of the technological iceberg in a school where the keyboard and digital display are as common as the chalkboard was 50 years ago.

In all English classes, individual laptops are used to turn a traditional book report into a computer presentation complete with clip art, animation and video.

Clifton says that not only has this approach made a previously unpopular exercise an exciting and inspiring activity, but it also has challenged students to use their "higher level learning skills" to organize their thoughts into bullet points, choose appropriate elements, and produce a coherent presentation.

"The kids become teachers themselves as they teach their peers," says Clifton.

Meanwhile, in another place and time

While English class is watching the presentations, students in science class may be recording weather data from a buoy in the Gulf of Mexico and passing it along to regional scientists via the 'net.

Meanwhile overhead, a kite equipped with a digital camera, designed and built by pupils (with a little help from NASA specialists) may be taking aerial pictures of the school.

Excel Technology students learn to build computers from parts. Students built five computers and donated them to a local elementary school's pre-kindergarten program.

Tupelo Middle School is one of the first schools in the United States to teach remote sensing, the use of technology to relay information to and from a distant location.

"It's teaching them the concept that you might not have to be right there to provide a service or receive one," said Clifton.

Via the distance learning lab, students can talk directly over a Web link with NASA experts and others in the field.

The distance learning lab also allows the school's teachers to instruct students statewide. A Spanish teacher in Tupelo takes her class to the lab where they are joined via the Internet by other pupils at schools that could not otherwise offer a Spanish course.

At night, the same lab is available to members of the local community to take college courses via links to classrooms at Mississippi State.

'A whole new world'

Another program fills the generation gap by again putting the students in the role of teachers.

When local seniors citizens and nursing home residents were provided with laptops, it was Tupelo Middle School students who taught them how to set up e-mail accounts and how to use the Internet. It's an initiative Clifton is particularly proud of.

"They [the students] were so good with them, they were so patient and they really bonded with them," she said.

"One of the senior citizens said that it opened up a whole new world for them," she said.

The links that have been forged with the seniors have become so strong, according to Clifton, that during summer vacation, senior citizens paid the students to come and give them extra coaching.

Some students even have been hired part-time by local computer companies.

Ultimately, it is the demand for technologically literate workers that motivates the school's approach.

"I think they are more prepared for the workforce," says Clifton.

"I think it does a lot of good things for students ... Our instruction is still traditional instruction. We are still teaching those core objectives; we're just doing a better job of it," she says.