Crestmoor teachers ask for Apples

Crestmoor Elementary teachers and administrators want to replace the school's antiquated computers with 32 new Apple notebook computers that would be wheeled into classrooms inside a cart.

Teachers will present their plan to obtain a "mobile laptop cart" at tonight's meeting of the school's Parent Teacher Association.

The San Bruno school is seeking grants as well as private and corporate donations to fund the laptops, expected to cost $40,000.

Fourth-grade teacher Roxanne Shapiro is leading the effort to raise money for the cart. She is preparing an application for a $5,000 grant from the Silicon Valley Community Foundation, a philanthropic organization that operates in San Mateo and Santa Clara counties. Shapiro said she also plans to look for other grant money.

The laptops would allow students to do research on the Internet and create charts with Microsoft Excel to learn multiplication, Shapiro said. The computers would also let Crestmoor students talk to other children around the world and do other tasks they cannot do in their classrooms.

"It's for a lot of hands-on stuff and differentiating the (lessons) to make things more lively in the classroom," Shapiro said. "It's an instant computer lab."

The laptops would be a quantum leap over what is now available to the students, she added.

According to school officials, each Crestmoor classroom has five to eight computers and a lab in the school's library has 10 computers. But the computers are seven and eight years old.

"These computers are really becoming outdated," said Principal Natalie Sheridan. "Having this mobile laptop cart and having every child at their seat with a laptop would be so valuable."

Crestmoor PTA President Florie Vasquez said she has heard about the teachers' plans and thinks parents will want to raise money to get the computers.

"I'm always really big on whatever the children need, but I don't have $40,000 in my pocket to write a check, which means we will have to step up," said Vasquez, who has a son in fourth grade and a daughter in kindergarten at the school.

Anyone interested in donating to Crestmoor is asked to call the school at 650-624-3145.