Professor Fisman's extrapolations are based on one study in Romania. He uses the findings from Romania to imply that none of the mentioned programs will work.

A few facts from the post need to be considered. first it is only one study. Earlier studies have shown that computers had BOTH negative and positive effect on "scholastic achievement". The claim that students with free computers GPAs "were 0.36 grade points lower than their nonvouchered counterparts" doesn't seem that serious. In a US school that would mean the students GPA went from a B+ to a B.

Students with computers are easily distracted. We as teachers deal with that everyday. Fisman also states that "...Malamud and Pop-Eleches' results suggest that merely providing access may be more of a curse than a blessing. If we really want to help poor kids, whether in Romania, sub-Saharan Africa, or America's housing projects, we may want to focus on approaches that provide structured, supervised access..."

That "supervised access" is the key to any new tool. It can be the afterschool programs Fisman suggests or parental involvement.

Another key issue when dealing with is the amount of information you are providing to students with Internet access when you provide computers. Will most of them use it to learn? Probably not, but what about the ones that do? What will they accomplish for their community and the world? Fisman’s post doesn’t deal with this very key issue.

This effort is totally misplaced. Children are poor because their parents are poor. The best way to help both would be to provide parents with a laptop that would help them raise their income, giving them more money to educate their children. Farmers could use one to improve farm techniques, track commodity prices and tack the weather. Mothers could use one to get health advice about their children. Those with small businesses could use one to track inventory and money. And email would help everyone stay in touch. And given the popularity of simple cell phones everywhere, perhaps these computers should have a data link to a cheap cell phone, rather than WiFi, with its limited range. In short, help the parents and let the parents take care of their kids.