ICT Ireland has called on the Government to make the provision of IT in Irish schools a national priority. ICT Ireland is the IBEC body representing the technology sector.
'We should set ourselves an ambitious target of having a laptop available to every student in our secondary schools within five years,' said ICT Ireland director Brendan Butler.
ICT Ireland said it supports the recent initiative by members of the telecommunications sector to deliver broadband access for all primary and secondary schools over the next two years.
Mr Butler said that while all schools have internet facilities, the availability of the internet in classrooms in very limited. According to the most recent ICT school census, only 30% of primary school classrooms and 12.9% of post-primary school classrooms have access to the internet.
He said a joint Government/Industry approach to integrating ICT into education would create a win win situation.
