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Anger over theft of school laptops

30/10/2003

PUPILS in south Manchester will be deprived of valuable computer training after thieves stole laptops worth £30,000.

The computers belonged to the Learn Direct training centre based at Parrs Wood, and are regularly loaned for free to local schools and allow pupils to get to grips with I.T. from an early age.

The loaned laptops allow schools to create a temporary IT suite and because they are portable pupils can use the laptops at their desks and learn vital IT skills. But now centre bosses say the pupils' lessons have been put in jepody by yobs who pinched the 29 laptops from a Longsight primary school, which had borrowed them for a term.

St John's Primary was not insured for the computers, and John Denney of the learning centre said he wasn't sure if the laptops would be replaced and so pupils will suffer.

He said: "It will mean that other schools won't be able to use them. We have a stock but not a lot and we will have to spread them round meaning pupils will have to share.

"To have things disappear is not that unusual but to deliberately target very expensive educational equipment is awful. It's really sad.
"The theft really will have an affect on all south Manchester pupils."

St Paul's Primary in Withington was one of the schools that had benefited from loaning laptops from the centre in the past and the scheme went down so well with pupils that the school is now planning on getting the same equipment.

Head teacher at St Paul's, Don Berry said: "A lot of schools cannot afford to buy a computers so this is a great way of getting them into the classroom.

"We were very grateful to the college for lending us their equipment it was very effective and it would be a tragedy if other schools didn't have the chance to use them."

Staff at the learning centre at Parrs Wood are currently checking the centre's insurance policy to see if the laptops can be replaced.