UW Law Prof Who Banned Laptops Says He Is Not a Luddite

Law Professors

UW Law Prof Who Banned Laptops Says He Is Not a Luddite

Posted Jun 27, 2008, 07:28 am CST
By Debra Cassens Weiss

A University of Wisconsin law professor is defending his decision to ban laptops in his constitutional law class.

Professor Anuj Desai tells the Wisconsin State Journal that he is not a “Luddite.”

Desai said that when he was in law school, he was the only student in his 1991 class to use a laptop computer. But his laptop had only word-processing capabilities, while computers today have wireless Internet access that offers many distractions.

Desai bans laptops in his con law class because it hampers discussion. “I want students engaged with not only what I'm saying but with what other students are saying so they can respond," he told the publication.

Earlier this year, the University of Chicago dealt with the problem of Web-surfing law students by shutting down Internet access in most of its classrooms. A University of Memphis law professor has also banned laptops, resulting in a complaint filed with the ABA, the story says.

Ann Althouse, another UW-Madison law professor, offers another solution in an interview with the Wisconsin State Journal. "The best remedy, if you think people aren't paying attention, is to be as interesting as possible," she said.

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Posted by Sheila - 5 months, 5 days, 12 hours, 14 minutes ago

I’ve just finished my third year of evening law school. I’ve finally gotten used to seeing students who are web-surfing or playing solitaire during class, but it’s been an adjustment. It’s awfully rude, not just to the teachers but to the other students for whom this can be distracted. (Then again, when I was in college in the pre-laptop era, I found it annoying that students would doodle.)

On the plus side—I like being able to take notes on my laptop, and I have seen instances where students were able to web surf and come up with a key piece of information to advance a discussion topic.
Posted by Chris - 5 months, 5 days, 7 hours, 27 minutes ago

Notebook computers do enable students to type their notes in real time, which is good. But the classroom abuse is so pervasive, and distracting, that if I were a law professor, I’d ban them too. I attended law school at night later in life. I was astonished at the number of students playing games or web surfing. Given the absence of an attendance policy, I never understood why those students came to class. While I had (and have) plenty of notebook computers, I found a spiral notebook and pen to work just fine for me. And I didn’t have to worry about battery life, power outlets, or someone walking off with my machine. “Simplicity, simplicity, simplicity! I say let your affairs be as one, two, three and to a hundred or a thousand… We are happy in proportion to the things we can do without.“ Henry David Thoreau

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