Electronic and computer based learning is the wave of the future. School boards should be embracing and planning for the tremendous changes they will experience. The concept of the mega-school complex with all of its liabilities will give way to smaller buildings spaced closer to the students so that there will be more time at school and less time traveling to and from school.

Students will learn with the aid of their computers and e-readers. Libraries will be much smaller because books and other information can be stored electronically in vast quantities in small spaces. Not as many teachers will be required because they will become facilitators instead of lecturers. Complex questions will be answered by sending them by e-mail or phone to a wide-area central location staffed by specialists who will have direct contact with the students.

Because of these changes, that can easily be anticipated, it is not wise to construct big school complexes that are costly and will become obsolete. Bond issues for these white-elephants that extend for decades should be withdrawn, scrapped, or voted down.

It is the school board that sees these changes coming, and gets ahead of the curve in providing the new, streamlined, smaller school units that will succeed. Students will be more successful, and it can all be done at a lower cost to the taxpayer. Again, any bond issues for mega-school buildings should be voted down!

Chuck Hagberg

Crosby