Rutherford County school issues laptop computers to students

A Rutherford County couple today launched a pilot program to give laptop computers to students throughout the county.

Kittrell School in Readyville issued over a hundred laptops to its seventh and eighth-graders.

Ira Brody, a former New York investment banker, and his wife Sara, paid 40 thousand dollars for the initiative, called LEAP, for Learning Educational Advancement Program.

The non-profit will look to raise a million dollars a year in order to give laptops to Rutherford County’s 3,000 seventh-graders.

Mr. Brody says the laptops at Kittrell will serve as a test, in order to work out details about how the program should expand.

“I think technology is such an important part of life as we grow in every job that we do, so giving these children an opportunity to learn at a young age how to use it will give them a leg up in whatever field they choose to go into down the road.”

Brody says students can take the laptops home, use them through high school, and keep them after they graduate.

Other programs to distribute laptops exist in various parts of the state. The non-profit Connected Tennessee has provided over a thousand so far this year, through its Computers 4 Kids program.

The Metro school district has considered issuing laptops, but says it’s not yet viable due to the expense.

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Ira Brody says the Asus laptops are running Linux and were selected for their compact size and durability, but as technology changes and the program expands it will consider other models.

You can visit LEAP online here.