Students given free MP3 players

alexakasloth · 8 Sep 2006 at 14:24

Dammit, I had 100% attendance, and yet I still got my EMA bonus 2 months late.

jcb33 said:
And from my last year in college (Im to old for EMA btw) let me tell you, there was not one brain cell between the entire set of first year sixth form students, they acted like 5 year olds not 16 year olds, screaming, shouting, getting told off by teachers, lets be fair they almost got a pencing in there face more than once

I probably met about 2 people who were asked to leave a classroom in my entire stay at college :S Was your college joined onto a secondary school?

Fishman · 8 Sep 2006 at 14:28

starscream said:
Thr irony!!

FYI I did realise it

What I'm sure you should have read into it is that these people should be getting trained in a skill useful society instead of wasting their time and someone elses money.

They mention that it will be the good students that get it, unfortunateky the good students already go to classes and do their homework and have zero need for an ipod for "podcasts" (I really hate that word and the guy that came up with it like it was something new and cool).
Instead it might make a few more idiots turn up, waste some time, get their free ipod and do a runner

shifty_uk · 8 Sep 2006 at 14:40

OT but, Ipods and other mp3 players should be banned from all public transport. I'm sick to death of having to put up with all the music coming from other poeples ear phones, you'd think these people are deaf with the volume they play their music at. I can't stand it! To make things even worse, its always rubbish tunes!

Students just happen to be the worst for it.

/rant

alexakasloth · 8 Sep 2006 at 14:45

shifty_uk said:
/rant

You can barely even hear my ipod when it's up full volume if your sitting next to me :S

Raikiri · 8 Sep 2006 at 14:58

shifty_uk said:
OT but, Ipods and other mp3 players should be banned from all public transport. I'm sick to death of having to put up with all the music coming from other poeples ear phones, you'd think these people are deaf with the volume they play their music at. I can't stand it! To make things even worse, its always rubbish tunes!

Students just happen to be the worst for it.

/rant

Buy an MP3 player then

Better yet get given one

St0rmer66 · 8 Sep 2006 at 15:56

And why does it have to be iPods? They're about the most expensive kind of mp3 player you can get! :confused:

Trifid · 8 Sep 2006 at 16:06

iPods sound better than some cheap tat that may have been more expensive.

I thought you get kicked out of college, I know I will be if I don't attend or put in 100% (well 90% as I don't go to a great school) effort.

Bri · 8 Sep 2006 at 16:10

A5H said:
Needs more oldschool caning. That'll sort em out.

I got caned all the way through college & university, didn't do me any good.

Raikiri · 8 Sep 2006 at 16:11

Trifid said:
iPods sound better than some cheap tat that may have been more expensive.

I thought you get kicked out of college, I know I will be if I don't attend or put in 100% (well 90% as I don't go to a great school) effort.

The one I suggested above is both better and cheaper

, plus how would cheap tat cost more?

jesta · 8 Sep 2006 at 16:13

St0rmer66 said:
And why does it have to be iPods? They're about the most expensive kind of mp3 player you can get!

Everyone knows what an iPod is and would be more attracted to it then something like an iRiver or Creative!

markk · 8 Sep 2006 at 16:49

hang about, £25,000 on 250 ipods? or are they planning on giving more then 1 ipod to the 250 students? :confused:

Mark.

Raikiri · 8 Sep 2006 at 16:53

markf said:
hang about, £25,000 on 250 ipods? or are they planning on giving more then 1 ipod to the 250 students?

Mark.

I think someone needs to go back to college

They are about £100 each, 250 x 100 = 25,000

escape sanity · 8 Sep 2006 at 16:54

25000 / 250 = £100 per iPod

If it does improve performance then it is worth it imo.

comp builder · 8 Sep 2006 at 16:58

greenlizard0 said:
That just sucks. I remember when at school my perfect attendance and e.g. handing in homework on time was never rewarded. Instead the class spack-face whose behaviour improved right before the end of term got the book vouchers

WOW!!! i bet he always wanted some book vouchers :rolleyes:

(and whats the point of giving him them anyway if hes anything like the idiots at my school he probably cant read very well, or not at all)

Berserker · 8 Sep 2006 at 17:02

ElRazur said:
I wonder if my uni will let me have a ps3 as part of my project research and to aid my dyslexia.

You'll have to convince Sony to let the rest of England have one first.

Anyway, I actually think this is a damned good idea - only I'd be tempted to say they should have given them dictaphones instead of iPods (unless of course the college will record the lectures and make them available for download). This isn't a new thing either - it's been done before.

I used to make a regular habit of tape recording lectures. It served me well (1st Class honours), but I can tell you electronic recording would have been far easier.

I should also point out that quite a few of those students should have paid tuition fees. Taxpayers money? Not necessarily. There seems to be an awful lot of outraged bandwagon jumping in here.

Fraggr · 8 Sep 2006 at 17:26

Sounds like an awesome idea, can't wait to get mine in 3 years

Fishman · 8 Sep 2006 at 17:55

Berserker said:
You'll have to convince Sony to let the rest of England have one first.

Anyway, I actually think this is a damned good idea - only I'd be tempted to say they should have given them dictaphones instead of iPods (unless of course the college will record the lectures and make them available for download). This isn't a new thing either - it's been done before.

I used to make a regular habit of tape recording lectures. It served me well (1st Class honours), but I can tell you electronic recording would have been far easier.

I should also point out that quite a few of those students should have paid tuition fees. Taxpayers money? Not necessarily. There seems to be an awful lot of outraged bandwagon jumping in here.

I am thinking that they are refering to A-level equivalents at this college (although it appears to be linked to or a "university" also. A-level students (or the equiv. qualification) do NOT need to record their classes. They need to turn up, pay attention and work. Sure there is a case for supplying recording equipment to dyslexic students if they are having problems keeping up but school type classes are rarely copy stuff off a board for an hour like at university.

If it is the college part they are refering to then they wont have paid any tuition fees. Given they mention attendence and completion of coursework being one of the allocation factors I am further thinking this is for further not higher education

I dunno about you but when I was at university (Notts Chemistry 1st) if I recorded every lecture I was in there wouldnt be enough time to relisten to most of it.

Neoni · 9 Sep 2006 at 03:44

ElRazur said:
I wonder if my uni will let me have a ps3 as part of my project research and to aid my dyslexia.

No.

Werewolf · 9 Sep 2006 at 05:37

Fishman said:
Quick search revealed not already posted (willing to be proved wrong)

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/education/5319258.stm

As if EMA wasnt abused enough here is another one.

"College students are to be given free iPods so they can catch up on missed lectures in their own time.
South Kent College in Dover has spent £25,000 on Nano iPods for 250 students in the hope they will listen to podcasts of lectures, as well as music."

purlease.....

"But Mr Coleman said the MP3 players would only be handed out next month to those teenagers who had completed all their assignments and had full attendance"

This doesnt really appear compatible with the first quote !

Another pitiful waste of taxpayers money

I beleive they've done something similar in several U.S. universities and shock, horror it actually helps - at least if done in a properly planned manner.

Imagine for a moment you have every lecture recorded and archived (can be done dirt cheap now*).
Now imagine if you then make those archived lectures available to current students to use for revision notes or if they miss a lecture, or if for some reason the lecturer isn't able to make it in due to other commitments but is able to record it before hand.
Or students of one lecturer listening to the archived lecture from another course/lecturer on a related subject and thus gaining an insight into their course (or if another lecturer doing the same course with different students is better at explaining certain things).

It sounds expensive, but it's only £100 per student and can probably be recovered by the saving in time from lecturers where otherwise the booked time would have been wasted, and improved results in exams because the students all have access to accurate (and complete) records of the lecture if they are having trouble understanding something in the course later on.
Not to mention the saving in time for the lecturers who might otherwise have had to answer the same query a dozen times because people missed making a note of something minor at the time.

You could argue that computers are a waste of time and money in schools (in fact I think there was that exact argument in the past), because they hadn't been used before and some people didn't see a need for their use in general education.

*A good mic. a PC or even a good mp3 player with line in and record functions, and a few minutes spent after the lecture naming the resulting audio file to let it be filed on the server with relation to that lesson and other resources for that session.

Vixen · 9 Sep 2006 at 07:59

I agree that the idea has great potential, and I would guess that they are using iPods as iTunes + podcast downloading is probably the easiest way to get students who aren't necessarily technically savvy to actually use them.

I think that it needs to be thought our properly, and the players only given to students who have shown they will use them (or at least won't abuse them), although I'd assume that this has already come up in the minds of the people who are dishing them out.

I think it would be a god-send even if universities were able (or willing) to host spoken lectures on their intranet. I'm sure that my class isn't the only one who has a lecturer or two who talks while the students are trying madly to copy down huge amounts of text from slides.