Uruguay is the first country in the world to commit to providing a free, internet-enabled computer to every one of its students, through the Massachusetts-based One Laptop Per Child initiative. It also aligned the hardware strategy with a national software strategy: a free, open YouTube channel (www.youtube.com/canalceibal) consisting of filmed classroom lessons in the core subjects.

Uruguay is realizing a vision of the future of education technology focused squarely on access to free technology and online resources. Unlike Vision 2 (Next-Generation Learning; see previous post), neither personalization nor budget-cutting are core to this vision.

The benefit of this arrangement is its simplicity. Schools don’t need to be fundamentally redesigned, teachers are still basically doing the same kind of work they were trained to do, and free resources can go online in relatively short order without much of a fuss about payment, royalties, and copyrights. Moreover, there is a decentralization of control: individual teachers are free to decide if and how they want to use the technology in the classroom. That’s a level of control that they don’t necessarily enjoy in Vision 2.

The simplicity of Uruguay’s program is also its weakness. As a report from the Inter-American Development Bank states, “Countries can not think that they will improve student learning by simply creating access to computers. The quality in use is crucial.” Without much of a plan in place for how to integrate computers into school, Uruguay’s educators are left dealing with lots of students surfing the web and distracting themselves in class.

But still, there are plenty of examples of remarkable success. An unofficial Ceibal blog, contains some impressive anecdotes of students who have spontaneously learned to write and read with their laptops. And when students take their laptops home they can become the center of learning for the entire household, which can have untold benefits on the entire family.

Brazil is beginning to take steps in a similar direction. Its “One Laptop per Student” program is in a pilot phase in 300 schools as the government determines whether and how to expand nationally. And of course, the state of Maine has a decade-old program to equip 7-12th grade students and teachers with their own machines. A handful of similar efforts are underway, and I’ve heard some really exciting stories about the new opportunities they have created as well as some depressing stories about students using the technology completely inappropriately and counterproductively.

So here’s my basic takeaway on this access-driven vision of education technology:  Universal access to technology and online education resources is an attainable and measurable goal. While it doesn’t have all the appeal of sophisticated personalized-learning systems, it still does put an enormous amount of power in the hands of students and teachers, and in the end, perhaps it’s not such a bad thing to leave the creative implementation to the “local” level, even if that means (as always) that some schools will ultimately do a much better job than others.

Given the attainability and relative affordability of universal access, it seems like an increasingly obvious and low-risk reform proposal. After all, if Uruguay can do it, why can’t we?

Note: This series is cross-posted at Edreformer.com