Quick Study

By A.J. Baughn, Jodie Morse and Desa Philadelphia

HIGH SCHOOL PALM PILOTS NOW GET HANDED OUT IN CLASS

Getting students organized used to mean buying a Trapper Keeper and hoping homework didn't fall out. But this fall a handful of schools have supplied students with the same wireless Palm Pilots used by hyper-scheduled executives. More portable and less pricey--$200, vs. about $2,000--than the laptops doled out by schools in recent years, the hand-held computers give students Internet access and allow teachers to "beam" them their grades and homework assignments. Add-ons include a "due yesterday" feature that dings when schoolwork is tardy and an attachable probe that measures pH in science labs. At River Hill High School, in Clarksville, Md., parents can use their children's devices to check on grades. But some students at other schools have gravitated toward less scholarly applications--beaming notes to one another in class.

K-12 THESE TEMPS DON'T TYPE PAPERS; THEY GRADE THEM

Not long ago, the Gulfport school district in Mississippi couldn't find enough substitute teachers. Principals spent half the day calling around to hire as many as 60 teachers for the district's 11 schools. Superintendent Carlos Hicks asked the local office of Kelly Services to help--and now the employment agency's temps are teaching in 23 states. Kelly screens potential teachers, trains them and provides benefits. Its subs get a premium rate, but administrators say they're worth it. One drawback: now that regular teachers know qualified substitutes can be easily found, absenteeism has increased slightly.

COLLEGE ATHLETICS DO SPORTS SPOIL OUR SCHOOLS?

In his new book out this fall, Beer and Circus: How Big-Time College Sports Is Crippling Undergraduate Education (Henry Holt), Indiana University professor Murray Sperber compares the American university of 2000 with Rome circa A.D. 100. To keep the populace happy, corrupt Emperors used bread and circuses. In the modern university, administrators use beer and circuses--or Division I athletics and the binge drinking that accompanies it--to distract students from their crowded lecture classes and inattentive professors. Sperber argues that the ncaa, the advertisers who profit from college sports and the Animal House undergrads are all complicit in the deteriorating quality of higher education.

CONTINUING EDUCATION THE PEACE CORPS SEEKS MINORITY VOLUNTEERS

The Peace Corps serves developing countries with mostly nonwhite populations, but only 15% of its 7,000 volunteers are minorities. So the corps is working to change that, in partnership with two historically black colleges. At Florida A&M University, students in a new master's program can earn academic credit by volunteering in the corps. At Texas Southern University, the corps will sponsor summer internships overseas.

--By A.J. Baughn, Jodie Morse and Desa Philadelphia