Hood College Gives Ipads to Students

By Mark H. Russ

With the help of funds from the Hodson Trust, Hood College provided iPads to undergraduate students this fall. In order to receive an iPad students had to be enrolled for at least 6.5 hours for the fall semester.

This included rising seniors, transfer students who are new to the college this semester, and transfer students who transferred to Hood in prior years and returned to the college this fall.

Christina Arnold, a communication arts major in her junior year said she thinks that the new iPads have been wonderful. “I like being able to follow the slides in class and go back and forth on my iPad to look at them,” she said. “It is also helpful to be able to have all of the course documents such as the syllabus, and all of the instructions for my classes at my fingertips... “I used to have to carry around a binder as thick as a telephone book, now all I have to remember is my iPad.”

Jennifer Lanigon, an education major also in her junior year, said that she finds the device useful as well. “I love it, being able to follow the professors in class is essential for me to be able to learn,” she said. “I also find it helpful to be able to look things up in class if I don’t understand how the professor explains it.”

Senior Steven Powell, a psychology major, says that the iPad helps him to stay connected. “I use it for email quite a bit. It has helped me to become more organized than I have been in past semesters”, he said.

Powell also stated that he makes notes and utilizes the calendar on his iPad.  “Before my iPad I wrote everything on whatever piece of paper I could find, practical maybe, but a disaster when trying to find where you wrote it later.”

Business and economic major LaBrea Cruz who is in her senior year has been positively impacted by the gift also. “As a business student this has been very helpful,” she said. “Sometimes I have to pull up magazines like Forbes and it is so convenient to be able to access everything up on my iPad and to not have to lug several magazines around along with my books.”

Cruz also said that the iPad was a wonderful gift that she thinks will help advance her education.

Adjunct professor Russ Hylton who teaches in the department of computer science said he feels that there are pros and cons to the students having the iPads. “It has been helpful as a professor, as we discuss in class, all new technology brings a trade off,” he said. “I like that it allows students to look things up quickly and allows me to engage with them and makes learning interactive.”

Hylton says that the downside is that he knows that sometimes the students are distracted and are probably looking at games, and not paying attention to the lecture.

Over all though he said that the iPads on campus are great and a wonderful thing for Hood to provide. “I think more than anything all students having an iPad and access to new technology levels the playing field,” Hylton said. “Not all students come from wealthy families and this helps them compete with other students in a way that they may not typically be able to.”