By Lou Baldwin • Special to the CS&T • Posted December 28, 2011

Apples for the teacher are a long tradition. How about Apples for the students? You’ve got to hand it to the class of 1960 at what was Bishop Neumann High School. When they celebrated their 50th anniversary they asked what is now SS. John Neumann and Maria Goretti High School to suggest a purpose for their class gift, and several options were suggested, including Apple iPads.Never mind the home computer hadn’t even been invented when these men went to Neumann. They cheerfully kicked in enough money to buy 30 iPads, which despite their small size, in many applications are miles ahead of standard computers.

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“We are the first school in the Archdiocese to initiate this,” said John Murawski, president of Neumann Goretti. “They will be used across the curriculum,” he said, explaining that could be a science lesson about cells, or accessing the Internet through the school’s web site or even projecting material to the classroom Smart Board.
“This is really going to be the future for students,” said technology teacher Robert Selig.
Students are already familiar with e-readers and laptop computers, but the iPads leapfrog that technology and are really as powerful as a small laptop, but with a touch screen instead of a keyboard, according to Selig.
At this point the iPads are restricted to classroom use, but Selig envisions the day, not far in the future, where every student has an iPad or similar technology.
“Down the road when every student has an iPad, we can get rid of textbooks as well,” he said.