Also at NECC, I sat in on a keynote address and a panel discussion on the topic of one laptop per child. A project spearheaded by Nicholas Negroponte plans to place 150,000,000 laptops into the hands of children in developing countries by 2008. While there seems to be a genuine commitment to rolling out this project in a big way with the so-called $100 laptop being developed by MIT, the panelists seemed to agree that the most difficult aspect of the project would be assuring that educators in developing countries are adequately trained to deliver the appropriate resource instruction. Content needed to meet the diverse needs of students was also a challenge addressed. This aspect of the project could cost hundreds of billions of dollars, far more than the cost of supplying computers to children.

Read more about the $100 laptop and view images of the concept designs.