SU honor students receive laptops from Title III initiative

Fifty select Southern University freshmen honor students were given tickets and instructed to report to a mandatory meeting on Jan. 22.
Allison Alford, a freshman honor student at Southern and one of the select students, believed that when she initially was informed of the mandatory meeting that they had done something wrong.
“I thought we were maybe in trouble, because it was mandatory,” said Alford in the Jan. 24th issue of The Advocate.
To the freshmen honor students’ dismay, the meeting was in actuality an opportunity for Southern officials and administration of the Dolores Margaret Richard Spikes Honors College to announce and introduce its new “Mobile Computing Initiative,” which is funded through a $1 million HBCU Title III grant program designed to upgrade technology for historically black colleges.
According to Beverly Wade, dean of the Honors College, officials at Southern opted to dedicate $50,000 of the money to buy laptops as part of a pilot program to help recruit more students to the honors program.
“Globally, this world is technology driven and we want our students prepared,” said Wade.
Although all freshman honor students did not receive a laptop, those that did had to meet certain qualifications for eligibility that include: membership in the Honors College, freshman classification, a cumulative grade point average of 3.3, 23/1060 ACT/SAT and be in need.
Recipients of the laptops were also issued a personal notebook contract, which calls for each individual to maintain upkeep, participate in a teaching-learning workshop and provide documentation of weekly use.
“This initiative (title III) is much more than students just getting computers. Congruent with receiving those computers, students will be required to attend lectures and training,” said Huey Lawson, director of Technology and Network Services.
Both Wade and Lawson agree in saying that the “Mobile Computing Initiative” is about affecting education and learning on a grander level.
Although students will have to check the notebooks in at the end of the semester, those same notebooks will be waiting for them upon their return in the fall and for the duration of their undergraduate careers.
The Honors College also encourages all students to use its computer lab, as well as inquire about checking-out one of three laptops designated specifically for student use.