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The Granite School District is buying a device that could change the way students read books. It would also make their backpacks a little lighter.
Administrators just got permission to buy 147 Amazon Kindles for district employees at a cost of roughly $360 a piece, or more than $50,000. If everything goes as planned, students should be getting their own in a few years.
Say goodbye to school libraries as we know them and hello to the Amazon Kindle. It's wireless. It uses electronic-paper technology to refresh each page on the screen. It's not going to cause eye strain, and you can buy books off Amazon anytime, anywhere.
"It's a great tool. It's the cutting edge of technology," said Jim Henderson, director of instructional technology for the Granite School District.
Henderson never thought he'd be saying that. "I swore I'd never give up my novel because I can't imagine. This came out, and I said I was wrong. I will give it up," he said.
Henderson bought his first Kindle a year ago. When he took it home and his wife wanted one too, he decided to buy the Kindle for 10 of the employees in his department.
"I love mine. I take it everywhere I go. It fits in my purse," said Cindy Moyle, library media teacher for the Granite School District.
Now, 147 more will get the device and will participate in the district's Avid Readers book club.
Henderson says introducing the Kindle into the book club will not only allow teachers to really see what the device can do, it will also get them talking to one another.
"That's one of the big problems we have in education is isolated teachers. You might be a media specialist in the school, but you don't interact with the other teachers as much. This gets you talking together about books, then you start recommending them to kids," Henderson said.
In two years, Henderson expects students will get Kindles too. "I think they'll read more books because it's available," Henderson said.
Textbooks aren't available for electronic download yet, but Henderson says that's the key to getting them in schools. "For this to go, there has to be buy in by the publishers," he said.
And if publishers do agree to a buy in, that could mean savings for school districts. "You've got kids hauling around textbooks. Some of them cost as much as $100. This Kindle became four books. If you get 10 percent, pretty soon you have not only purchased the device, you've saved a lot of money," Henderson said.
If an actual book costs $25 on Amazon.com; the electronic version is just $10. Henderson says Amazon will allow the district to put the electronic version on six devices for the same price, making it more cost effective.
E-mail: corton@ksl.com
E-mail: aadams@ksl.com
