- 2004.12.03
My response to
The Mac attack: No sympathy here for teachers polishing
Apples by Rich Brooks, an article published in the Sarasota
[FL] Herald Tribune on Saturday, November 27, 2004.
Dear Mr. Brooks,
You know what this message is about. You're even now, as you skim
over the opening lines of this message, trying to make a split second
decision about whether to read the rest of it or delete it along with
the dozens of other pro-Mac letters you've gotten. Some of them will be
poorly written, riddled with personal attacks or insults, most
centering on the whole "no-brainer" opening you left for them. Others
will be thoughtful, listing dozens of studies and giving links to web
sites such as John Droz's (http://www.macvspc.info) and Doug
Gilliliand's (http://honorsphysicalscience.com/),
which you manage to mention without providing a Web address so we can
read it for ourselves.
So maybe you can respond to this message without reading it, since
you've probably classified it already as one of those "fanatic" letters
and had your incoming mail route it to a special folder where you can
read it later when you're not writing important stuff . . .
for example, I know you'll be busy writing another column about all of
these fanatical Mac users just don't understand the "reality" of
today's business climate. I won't bother repeating the old saw about
one of the reasons Mac market share is so low is because people have to
replace their PCs more often (market share is not user share); you
won't read it.
From your point of view, you won't need to read it. Your mind is
made up; like all objective journalists and balanced editorial writers,
you've seen both sides of the issue, thought about the opposing
arguments, taken a stand, and stuck to it. Amazingly enough, you've
done so without actually using a Mac, so my hat is off to you. (At
least when I write articles critical of the PC, I sit down at a PC and
try to do things. I wish I was as smart as you. Seems like you're
getting by with half the effort I put into this sort of thing.)
Perhaps you could spare a few minutes and fly out here to my school
district and fix our school network for us, which was recently infected
with a Trojan horse by a student in a computer class. Now our network
goes down regularly, teacher computers are compromised and filling up
with spyware (at least the PCs do), and thanks to the McDonalds's
theory of computing platform preference (Biggest Market Share Trumps
Quality Product Every Time), we're even banned from buying Macs.
That's supposed to solve the problem somehow, although exact
mechanism of how that works is a little bit beyond my meager
understanding. It's kind of ironic, since Macs are the only computers
immune to the entire morass of junk infecting our network - at least if
I understand the meaning of the word "ironic." It might take some smart
journalist-type guy to 'splain it to me.
So thanks for encouraging your district and others to keep those IT
guys employed. We sure need more of 'em, because our poor folks are
putting in long hours for little appreciation and letting every other
work order fall by the wayside. If we're lucky, twice as many techs
could keep up with the demand and re-image every single PC in our
district just in time for summer.
I'm sure that's good for business. Not my business, but
someone's.
My business is teaching, and boy it sure would be nice to have
someone come out here and show me now to do my job. After you've fixed
your local district, maybe you can come out here and show us how to
make photocopies more efficiently by making copies on both sides of the
paper or something.
- Jeff Adkins
Teacher of the Year
Antioch Unified School District
Antioch, California
cc: heraldtribune letters to the editor
is a longtime Mac user. He was using digital sensors on Apple II computers in the 1980's and has networked computers in his classroom since before the internet existed. In 2006 he was selected at the California Computer Using Educator's teacher of the year. His students have used NASA space probes and regularly participate in piloting new materials for NASA. He is the author of two books and numerous articles and scientific papers. He currently teaches astronomy and physics in California, where he lives with his twin sons, Jony and Ben.< And there's still a Mac G3 in his classroom which finds occasional use.
