An invisible border divides those, arguing for computers in the classroom on the behalf of

students career prospects and those arguing for computers in the classroom for broader reasons of radical educational reform. Very few write on the subject: have explored this distinction -- indeed, contradiction -- which goes to the heart of what is wrong with the campaign to put computers in the dark.

An education that aims at getting a student a certain kind of job is a technical education, justified for reasons radically different from why education is universally required by law. It is not simply to raise everyone’s job prospects that all children are legally required to attend school into their teens. Rather, we have a certain conception of the American citizen, a character who is incomplete if he cannot competently asses how his livelihood and happiness are affected by things outside of himself. But this was not always the case, before it was legally required for all children to attend school until a certain age. It was widely acteristic of all industrialized countries, we came to accept that everyone is fit to be educated. Computer education advocates forsake this optimistic notion for a pessimism that betrays their otherwise cheery out-look. Banking on the confusion between educational and vocational reasons for bringing computers into schools, computer advocates often emphasize the job prospects of graduates over their educational achievement.

There are some good arguments for a technical education given the fight kind of student. Many European schools intro- duce the concept of professional training early on in order to make sure children are properly equipped for the profession they want to join. It is, however, presumptuous to insist that there will only be so many jobs for so many scientists, so many businessmen, so many accountants. Besides, this is unlikely to produce the needed number of every kind of professional in a country as large as ours and where the economy is spread over so many states and involves so many international corporations.

But, for a small group of students, professional training might be the way to go since well-developed skills, all other factors being equal, can be the difference between having a job and not. Of course, the basics of using any computer these days are very simple. It does not take a life-ling acquaintance to pick up various software programs. If one wanted to be- come a computer engineer, that is of course, an entirely different computer skills are only complementary to the host of great skills that are necessary to becoming any kind of professional. It should be observed, of course that no school, vocational or not, is helped by a confusion over its purpose.

The author thinks the present, rush to put computers in the classroom is _____.

A．far-reaching

B．dubiously oriented

C．self-contradictory

D．radically reformatory