SCHOOLS TO STUDENTS: BE LESS ONLINE, MORE... UGH, SCHOOL?

Santa Barbara Unified, in a stunning display of bureaucratic innovation, has unveiled its 'Tech with Intent' program, which, according to KSBY News, involves slapping new restrictions on student iPad and Google account access. It seems that after investing millions in shiny screens and 'educational' apps, some bright spark in the district finally noticed that perhaps, just perhaps, giving every child unfettered internet access might lead to less geometry and more meme consumption. We're shocked, truly.

The real intention here, of course, isn’t to improve learning, but to finally address the glaring omission on parents' property tax bills: the 'babysitter-in-a-tablet' surcharge. After years of touting how technology would 'revolutionize education' (read: make teachers' jobs easier by offloading instruction to YouTube), the district is now scrambling to limit the damage. It’s almost as if endless screen time, devoid of actual, you know, *teaching*, doesn't produce Nobel laureates but rather just really good scrollers.

One has to wonder what took them so long. Did the lightbulb moment come when a particularly zealous student tried to Venmo their homework for 'processing' by an AI? Or perhaps when the school's Wi-Fi traffic looked suspiciously like a crypto mining farm? The sheer audacity of these progressive educators to introduce technology they clearly didn't understand, only to now 'restrict with intent' is a masterclass in failing upwards. Meanwhile, actual curriculum standards continue their downward trajectory, but hey, at least the kids won't be ordering Postmates during calculus anymore. Probably.

This 'Tech with Intent' sounds suspiciously like 'Tech with Regret,' a belated attempt to rein in a digital free-for-all that was entirely of the district's own making. Instead of focusing on getting kids back to basics, reading, writing, and actual human interaction, they're busy micro-managing digital access. Perhaps the district should have had intent *before* handing out expensive toys, saving taxpayers millions and students from becoming professional digital nomads in the making. But that would require common sense, something in short supply among the educational elite.