If you’re Scottish, and a school kid, then you might be getting a PDA. Scotland’s Lothian Councils, the governing bodies for an area of the Southeast known as the Lothians, have put forth a plan to give each of the area’s 60,000 students an Internet-enabled PDA with the goal of making pupils more involved in their studies.
The PDAs would have built-in access to coursework, homework, school activities, and other Web features related to being a student. We’re sure, however, they’ll be used to check MySpace.
The $49 Million project is as of yet unfunded, though the Councils are looking at setting up a charitable trust or the UK National Lottery to underwrite the initiative. There’s no word of what PDAs are being considered, or which platform they’ll use, but whichever supplier is chosen will receive a windfall, as the 60k handhelds will also require infrastructure and support, which actually has higher profit margins than hardware itself.
Scottish School Kids Get Free PDAs [IT Week]