Computer Access :: Personal Narrative Technology Essays

Computer Access My experience with access to computers has been a roller coaster ride this year at school. At the end of the last year’s school year, when I had to face the scary fact that I would be in charge of producing a 240 page yearbook, I knew that I needed to start planning right then and there. Since I knew the adviser I was taking over for had a TTI laptop on loan from the school and would have to give it back, I wrote the principal a note inquiring how I could get my hands on that precious piece of technology. I knew having an instrument that I could carry with me back and forth to school would make the nightmare of being a yearbook adviser a little bit easier, since I knew I would be devoting a lot of time after school to this second job. Excited about this prospect, I felt like I had been literally punched in the stomach when I got a note back that read "Contact Media Services". After contacting Media Services and asking if I could trade in my TTI IMAC for a laptop, I was told th at the TTI contracts were for three years and I couldn’t make a "trade". I already had my own desktop computer at home, so the IMAC sat next to my computer, only to go unused. What I waste, I thought to myself. But what could I do? I travel to three different classrooms throughout my school day, so I don’t even have anywhere that I can store the IMAC for easy access. Discouraged, one of my fellow English colleagues offered up her TTI laptop, since she had other "access". Excited, I eagerly accepted. I was instantly able to download Adobe PageMaker 7.0 and all of the other yearbook software I would need. Pumped, I still needed to follow up on a proposal that was submitted for an $8,000 technology grant for yearbook computers. I contacted the appropriate person to find out that the grant was approved. Once the check was received at school I contacted a Media Services Specialist from the district who happily helped me pick out computers that would get the yearbook job done. I ended up with four Dell desktops, one of which we call the "Mother Ship" because it has a zip drive, the most memory, and some other bells and whistles.